Hungary drove a top university campus into exile

JD Vance said it should be a model for the US

“The closest conservatives have ever gotten to successfully dealing with the left-wing domination of universities is Viktor Orbán’s approach in Hungary,” Vance said in 2024.

April 11, 2026, 6:30 AM EDT

By Alexander Smith

BUDAPEST, Hungary — The Central European University in Hungary’s capital still looks the part.

Its limestone entrance rises above a grand 1820s mansion, its newer additions all hard modern lines and confidence. It has won architecture awards. It was built to suggest a certain kind of Hungary, too: outward-looking, liberal, at ease with the West.

Today it is eerily quiet.

Founded by George Soros after the fall of communism, the university says the authoritarian government of Viktor Orbán forced 90% of its teaching operations out of the country in 2019, leaving behind a stark symbol of how far the nation has moved during the prime minister’s 16-year regime.

https://www.nbcnews.com/world/europe/orban-hungary-university-exile-jd-vance-model-us-rcna267253