Romania Has Dodged the Far Right Twice. Its Luck May Be Running Out

The European Union narrowly avoided the emergence of an extremely challenging and revisionist leader in November 2024, one who would have taken a Viktor Orbán-esque approach to the Union and its decision-making capabilities. Călin Georgescu, a lesser known, but not wholly obscure figure, won the first-round of the 2024 Romanian Presidential Election in a shock result; having been almost entirely absent in the polls throughout the campaign. The two candidates advancing were expected to be the Social Democratic Party’s (PSD) Marcel Ciolacu, and the populist-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians’ (AUR) George Simion. However, it was instead the outsider Georgescu and the centrist Save Romania Union (USR) candidate Elena Lasconi who qualified for the second-round. 

Georgescu ran on an anti-NATO, pro-Kremlin and ultranationalist platform, and gained support among those disillusioned with traditional politics, such as young voters, rural voters and conspiracy theorists. Georgescu was however never able to compete for the presidency in the second round, as his campaign, largely conducted through ‘astroturfing’ on TikTok and other social media channels, was found to be doped and bolstered by the presence of Kremlin-backed bot accounts. As a result of this, the Constitutional Court (CC) voided the election. Whilst polls suggested that Lasconi was the favourite for the second round, a Georgescu win was not out of the question. 2024 therefore represented a close shave for Romania with the far-right, and this would again be seen in the election rerun six months later.

Georgescu was barred from standing in the May 2025 election rerun because the CC ruled that he violated his obligation to defend democracy. Therefore, the populist-right impetus was shifted onto Simion’s shoulders. Simion is a better known and more mainstream version of Georgescu; a figure who is pro-NATO and has condemned Russia, but who is also Eurosceptic and critical of support for Ukraine. Simion, as a less extreme figure, could therefore mobilise more of the Romanian electorate behind him, and won a seemingly unassailable 41% of the vote in the first-round. 

However, again the populist-right was denied office, as Simion was defeated by the centrist Nicușor Dan by 53.6% to 46.4% in the second-round. Dan managed to win the support of almost all the voters of other defeated first round candidates in the second round, and pipped Simion to the presidency when the latter was expected to triumph. For the second time in six months therefore Romania nearly elected a populist-right president, but the pro-European centre held firm.

2024 was the first time in a while that the populist-right had performed well in a Romanian election, but it was not the first time entirely. Back in the early 2000s, in an era of illiberal PSD dominance under the first ‘democratic’ President Ion Iliescu, the Greater Romania Party (PRM) of Corneliu Vadim Tudor was the second largest party in the country. Tudor reached the second-round of the 2000 Presidential election, where he lost to Iliescu, and the party gained the second most members in the Romanian Parliament election of the same year. PRM promoted a ‘Greater Romania’, encompassing the whole of Moldova and parts of Ukraine, displayed nostalgia for the Axis-backed dictator Ion Antonescu and communist dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu, and called for the outlawing of the ethnic Hungarian party. 

Tudor’s second-round defeat to Iliescu was similar to Jean Marie Le Pen’s 2002 defeat to Jacques Chirac in the French Presidential Election, as Tudor was resoundingly defeated due to the coalition of left and centre-right factions against him. Despite PRM never reaching power (and never being especially close to doing so) they are a representation of the persistent strength of anti-establishment, nationalist and populist tendencies in Romania. PRM would fade into electoral obscurity in the late 2000s, but their ideas would resurface later in time.

As of early September, AUR are at the top of opinion polls for the next parliamentary election, due in 2028. A revolving door of Prime Ministers and a split in the coalition between PSD and the National Liberal Party (PNL) has led to a sense of political repetitiveness and hopelessness in Romania, and therefore a bolstering of the anti-establishment AUR. PSD have broken the general European social democratic firewall of not collaborating with the populist-right by voting with AUR to topple Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan, despite insisting for months beforehand that such a move was out of the question. PSD have been criticised for this, including by other Socialist and Democrat (S&D) member parties across Europe, but seem willing to work with AUR to achieve their political aims. This only serves to strengthen the latter and make them appear to be a party of government rather than a fringe protest party.

AUR and the Romanian populist-right therefore stand at the precipice of power: far ahead in the polls, treated as a governing party, and benefitting from the current populist popularity across the continent. Obviously, a lot could happen in the next couple of years, Romanian politics is volatile, and AUR’s popularity is not watertight. Furthermore, AUR could possibly struggle to find coalition partners. If PSD realigns with PNL, USR and other moderate forces, or if anti-AUR voters align behind one presidential candidate, as they did in 2025, then AUR may again find themselves blocked. Romania’s populist-right is however undoubtedly in its strongest position to date, and their continual knocking on the door could finally pay off in the elections to come.

Image: Wikimedia Commons/AUR Alianța pentru Unirea Românilor

No image changes made.