Reading from a prepared statement at a short press conference early on Tuesday evening, Jan. 7, Pressman said that in his various positions of authority “Minister Rogán has enriched himself and those loyal to his political party. He has used his official power for personal gain, depriving his country and its citizens of needed financial resources, while weakening institutions vital to a strong democracy.”
Moreover, the ambassador then went further, enlarging the accusation to envelop a broader, if unnamed, group of the ruling elite.
“For too long, senior government officials in Hungary have used positions of power to enrich themselves and their families, moving significant funds from the public purse into private pockets. It is no accident that when one peruses the list of Hungary’s richest, hovering near the top are the family and friends of the leaders of Hungary’s government. Those closely connected to the ruling political party have acquired massive empires of holdings. Antal Rogán is a primary architect, implementer, and beneficiary of this system of corruption,” Pressman stated.
The sanctions, officially imposed by the U.S. Department of the Treasury, mean access to any property or assets owned by Rogán in the United States are blocked and the minister is also under a travel ban to U.S. territories.
In addition, “financial institutions and other persons” undertaking business or financial transactions with Rogán may potentially suffer from U.S. legal action, according to a treasury press release.
The measure was described as “unprecedented” against a minister of a government of a member state of the European Union and NATO, an embassy spokesperson told the Budapest Business Journal.
In a swift response on Facebook, Hungarian Minister if Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó hit back, denouncing the U.S. move as the “personal revenge” of what he framed as an unsuccessful U.S. ambassador sent to Hungary by a “failed administration.”
“It’s good that in a few days the United States will be led by people who view our country as friends, and not enemies,” Szijjártó declared.
Gergely Gulyás, Head of the Prime Minister’s Office, dismissed the sanctions as the outgoing Democratic administration’s “petty and baseless revenge.”
Péter Magyar, leader of the opposition Tisza Party, argued in his response that it should be the domestic justice system doing the sanctioning.
“The prompt prosecution of Antal Rogán is not the task of foreign powers, but the responsibility of the Hungarian judiciary,m” Magyar wrote in a Facebook post. Repeating his call for the resignation of the entire government, he added: “In recent years we have seen unprecedented bad governance and serious destruction in our country.”
The financial markets appeared unshaken by the sanctions news, the Hungarian forint moving in a narrow band around HUF 415.50 to the euro before and after the announcement, according to the foreign exchange website XE.
“The market expects Trump to reverse it [the sanctions decision]. It has been a long time coming, too long in fact, but I expect the [incoming] administration to reverse it,” Péter Róna, the Hungarian economist and Oxford University emeritus professor said in response to questions from the BBJ.
“In reality it is a fairly meaningless gesture coming as it does 12 days before the end of the Biden administration,” added Róna, who was the nominee of the United for Hungary political alliance in the 2022 Hungarian presidential election and led the rightist Jobbik party’s list in the 2024 European Parliamentary election.
Indeed, for any chance of making the sanctions effective long-term, Róna argued that the Biden administration should release all the evidence on which its decision is based, but that would probably risk compromising sources.
Róna, who played a significant role in establishing Hungarian-U.S. relations in the early years of Hungary’s transition (including assisting then Prime Minister József Antall’s official visit to the States in October 1990) brushed off any concerns about the sanctions affecting U.S. investor sentiment.
“There isn’t much of an investment case for Hungary [today]. There is little growth, no surplus labor, a small domestic market and bad relations with other European Union countries and unpredictable economic policies,” he noted.
As has been his wont in public statements critical of the Hungarian government, U.S. Ambassador David Pressman made a specific effort to differentiate between the administration of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and the Hungarian people in his Tuesday press conference.
Stressing that the sanctions decision on Minister Rogán was “a moment that the United States hoped we would never reach,” and that America “takes no pride in having to resort to actions like this with an ally,” he declared the action had been taken “with our shared interests foremost in our mind.”
Pressman insisted: “The American and Hungarian people have an enduring connection, one that we cherish and one that we will protect. Today’s actions are a reflection of, not a departure from, our longstanding commitment to this extraordinary country and our enduring relationship with its people.”
The ambassador, who, as a political appointee, is set to leave his post immediately the Trump administration comes into office on Jan. 20, also sought to deflect what he believed would be the government’s response through its media organs.
“It is well known that Antal Rogán also plays a central role in controlling Hungary’s media ecosystem, so I can imagine what he will direct the newspapers to write tomorrow,” Pressman said.
However, while what he termed “Minister Rogán’s media megaphones” would likely seek to make the sanctions a story about partisan politics or an affront to national sovereignty, the U.S. move is “actually the reverse,” he argued.
“It is not the United States that threatens Hungary’s sovereignty, but rather the kleptocratic ecosystem Minister Rogán has helped to build and direct and that he has benefited from personally,” the ambassador underlined.
It appears from an initial scan of domestic media stories from outlets close to the government that the Hungarian people are unlikely to be exposed to these finer points within the ambassador’s address.
This article was first published in the Budapest Business Journal print issue of January 10, 2025.
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