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FILE – President Donald Trump, right, meets with Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban in the Cabinet Room of the White House, Nov. 7, 2025, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Evan Vucci\/AP<\/p>\n
FILE – President Donald Trump greets Argentina’s President Javier Milei at the White House, Oct. 14, 2025, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Alex Brandon\/AP<\/p>\n
FILE – President Donald Trump and Polish President Karol Nawrocki, right, walk along the colonnade toward the Oval Office at the White House, Sept. 3, 2025, in Washington.<\/p>\n
Evan Vucci\/AP<\/p>\n
FILE – President Donald Trump shakes hands with President of Honduras Nasry Asfura at the Shield of the Americas Summit, March 7, 2026, at Trump National Doral Miami in Doral, Fla.<\/p>\n
Mark Schiefelbein\/AP<\/p>\n
WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 In Hungary, President Donald Trump and his top officials used social media and an election-eve trip to Budapest to promote the country\u2019s far-right prime minister in his reelection campaign.<\/p>\n
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In Argentina, the U.S. administration worked to prop up the country\u2019s financial markets to the tune of $20 billion — then Trump threatened to pull the assistance if its elections didn\u2019t go his preferred way.<\/p>\n
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And in Honduras, he backed a conservative former mayor for president \u2014 and pardoned a predecessor from the same political party as Hondurans were preparing to vote.<\/p>\n
In his second term, Trump has made a public flex of his political influence abroad on a scale that few if any U.S. presidents have exerted, trying to marshal power that he\u2019s used domestically to sway races in Latin America, Asia and Eastern Europe.<\/p>\n
Using endorsements to reward loyal and like-minded leaders, he has shattered a U.S. tradition of avoiding overt involvement in the internal politics of other countries, and made the use of some foreign policy tools more about politics than about advancing U.S. interests, according to his critics.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe impact of that is to really cheapen a relationship,\u201d said David Pressman, who served as the U.S. ambassador to Hungary during the Biden administration. Pressman, who was on the ground in Budapest as Orban publicly backed Trump in 2024, said Hungarian positions on key issues such as Ukraine felt \u201cinfused through a political U.S. rubric,\u201d rather than articulated as sovereign foreign policy.<\/p>\n
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The most significant test yet of Trump\u2019s political power abroad may come Sunday, when voters in Hungary render a verdict on Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n’s bid for a fifth term. Orb\u00e1n was the first European leader to back Trump during his 2016 run and remained a close ally even during Trump\u2019s period of political exile, making sojourns to see him in south Florida and again endorsing the Republican in his 2024 comeback race.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love Hungary and I love that Viktor,\u201d Trump said this week as Vice President JD Vance, visiting Budapest, put him on speakerphone at a rally with more than 1,000 Orb\u00e1n supporters.<\/p>\n
Trump says he loves to pick winners<\/p>\n
Trump has long reveled in his status as kingmaker in the Republican Party. Now, he boasts that foreign leaders come to him seeking his approval.<\/p>\n
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\u201cI love it when I give endorsements and people win,\u201d Trump said last month at a summit with several Latin American leaders whom he had backed.<\/p>\n
Often, his picks share his policy views, like fellow immigration hard-liners Orb\u00e1n and Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, or the chainsaw-wielding Argentine President Javier Milei, who used the tool to illustrate his zeal to slash spending.<\/p>\n
Trump and his officials have often used the Conservative Political Action Conference as a stage for promoting their foreign political friends.<\/p>\n
At a CPAC gathering in Warsaw last year, then-Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem urged Poles to vote for conservative Karol Nawrocki, and implied that the future of the U.S. military presence in Poland could hinge on the election\u2019s outcome. Nawrocki would go on to win.<\/p>\n
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In Hungary last month, Trump greeted CPAC attendees with a video message from behind the Resolute Desk, urging support for Orb\u00e1n.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe prime minister has been a strong leader who\u2019s shown the entire world what\u2019s possible when you defend your borders, your culture, your heritage, your sovereignty and your values,\u201d Trump said. He later added, \u201cI hope he wins, and I hope he wins big.\u201d<\/p>\n
The White House defended Trump\u2019s approach as a sign of transparency.<\/p>\n
\u201cPresident Trump is a great American statesman who will speak or work with anyone, and he makes no secret about those he likes or supports,\u201d spokeswoman Anna Kelly said. \u201cMany individuals who align with President Trump\u2019s ideology are getting elected to top offices around the world because everyone wants to replicate his immeasurable success on behalf of the American people,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
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Sunday’s election is a big test of Trump’s foreign political clout<\/p>\n
Few foreign leaders have amassed as much political support from the Trump administration as Orb\u00e1n. The U.S. president has fired off multiple Truth Social posts promoting the prime minister, whose hard-right authoritarian approach to governance has endeared him to Trump, as did his fealty to the U.S. president even when Trump was out of power.<\/p>\n
\u201cHungary: GET OUT AND VOTE FOR VIKTOR ORB\u00c1N,\u201d Trump posted Thursday night. On Friday, he said his administration \u201cstands ready to use the full Economic Might of the United States\u201d to help Hungary’s economy, if Orb\u00e1n and Hungarians need it.<\/p>\n