With Hungary heading to elections on 12 April, Prime Minister Viktor Orban is not only defending his position at home, but trying to push his self-described “illiberal democracy” model across Europe. At the centre of that effort is a think tank which aims to influence politicians in Brussels.
MCC Brussels is the European Union-facing branch of Mathias Corvinus Collegium – the Budapest-based organisation Orban’s government has turned into “the mouthpiece of the Orban regime in the EU quarter in Brussels", according to Olivier Hoedeman of the Corporate Europe Observatory research and campaign group.
According to Hoedeman, MCC Brussels presents itself as a think tank, but in practice works with “a very much predetermined agenda”, rather than open-ended research – an agenda which promotes authoritarian, conservative politics inside the European Parliament.
MCC Brussels publishes reports, organises debates and workshops, and produces videos which circulate through far-right networks across Europe, and are used by the European Parliament's Patriots for Europe bloc.
This bloc consists of far-right parties, including Hungary's Fidesz, France's National Rally and Union of the Rights for the Republic parties, the Italian Lega per Salvini Premier and the Freedom Party of Austria (FPO).
On 23 March, members of these parties gathered in Budapest for the Patriots’ Grand Assembly, a congress of nationalist movements hosted by Orbán. The event drew key figures from Europe’s populist right, including Marine Le Pen, Matteo Salvini and FPO leader Herbert Kickl, pledging to strengthen cooperation before the 2029 European Parliament elections.
Hoedeman sees MCC Brussels as a politically driven operation with “predetermined conclusions”, designed to undermine EU-level protections for climate policy, civil society, gender rights and minority rights.
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'Decline of national sovereignty'
MCC flatly rejects that description. Rodrigo Ballester Esquivias, head of the Centre for European Studies at MCC, told RFI the group is trying to correct what he sees as excessive centralisation in the EU.
In the 2025 report The Great Reset, which he co-authored with the Warsaw-based Ordo Iuris Institute, he writes that the “increasing decline of national sovereignty” is part of Europe’s problem.
The Great Reset was launched at various events across Europe, including in France and Spain, and far-right parties across Europe have incorporated elements of the report into their programmes, according to Hoedeman.
Dissolving national sovereignty "was not the plan 70 years ago,” Esquivias says. "If you want a strong European Union... you need to build it also on strong member states."
For him, the alternative is either “fierce nationalism” or an EU that “castrates the nations” in the name of integration.
The goal of the Great Reset report was to widen the debate on Europe’s future, he says. “We want to show that a reform of the treaties can mean less centralisation,” he explains, arguing that the Brussels consensus too often assumes “more Europe” is the only direction possible.
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In his view, the EU should be “much more pragmatic, much more neutral”, and should be built from the “bottom up” through strong member states, rather than from the “top down” through Brussels.
Hoedeman disagrees, saying that rather than strengthening the EU, the ideas presented in the report "basically mean a transfer of power away from the European Commission and the European Parliament, and a weakening of the powers of the European Court of Justice, and a re-nationalising that would undermine completely the role that the EU can have in defending citizens’ rights".
He says these could include sexual minority rights, gender rights, environmental rights and digital rights.
'Unlimited resources'
For Hoedeman, the strength of MCC’s message lies in the resources behind it.
Dr Balázs Orbán, chairman of the board of trustees of MCC – and political director to Viktor Orban (no relation) since 2021 – told Euronews the organisation received "a huge endowment, around €1.5 billion endowment from the Hungarian state" when it gained the status of a public foundation in 2020, which it says makes it independent.
This endowment also included stakes in MOL, Hungary’s state oil and gas company, which has profited from Russian energy imports.
That funding, according to Hoedeman, gives MCC Brussels “virtually unlimited resources” putting its budget second only to the prestigious Bruegel Institute, which receives combined funding from some 20 EU member states.
MCC has also deepened its ideological and financial links with the American right, including the Heritage Foundation – responsible for President Donald Trump's ultra-conservative "Mandate for Leadership – Project 2025" – and MAGA-aligned networks.
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Esquivias welcomes this transatlantic dimension, saying the debate should not be shut down by what he calls Brussels' conformity.
According to recent polls ahead of the election on 12 April, Orban is trailing his main opponent, Peter Magyar of the centre-right Tisza party.
Tisza has the support of 56 percent of decided voters, up from 53 percent in early March, while 37 percent are backing Orban's backed Fidesz, down from 39 percent three weeks ago, a poll by 21 Research Centre showed.
In the event of an Orban loss, the MCC "could face an existential threat,” says Hoedeman, if a new Hungarian government tries to reverse the transfer of public assets that have built the organisation’s wealth.
But he adds that the network now has other funding options, including support from US right-wing billionaires – corroborated by a recent report by investigative group Follow the Money that reveals the US is by far the biggest donor to Brussels-based think tanks. Donations from the US are worth €115 million a year, against €70 million from Germany and €41 million from the European Commission.
