BRUSSELS — European leaders on Monday celebrated the restoration of democratic values in Hungary following the election of Péter Magyar, a 45-year-old lawyer who spent approximately two decades as a loyal functionary inside the political system he has now been elected to dismantle.

Magyar's Tisza party won 137 of 199 parliamentary seats on Sunday, a two-thirds majority that analysts noted was the same margin Orbán had used since 2010 to enact the constitutional changes that European institutions classified as transforming Hungary into a "hybrid regime of electoral autocracy." Magyar has indicated he intends to use the same majority to reverse those changes, which observers described as a promising use of the mechanism.

"Today we won because the Hungarian people didn't ask what their country could do for them, but what they could do for their country," Magyar told supporters on the banks of the Danube, in a line attributed to a former American president whose country's current president has declined to comment on the result.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called the outcome a "victory for fundamental freedoms." Congratulatory messages arrived from the leaders of France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Poland, Spain, Romania, Denmark, Ireland, Sweden and Slovenia. The White House, whose occupant had vocally endorsed Orbán ahead of the election, issued no statement as of Monday morning.

Magyar's path to democratic restoration began in February 2024, when he gave a viral interview accusing Orbán's government of corruption — approximately twenty years after joining Orbán's Fidesz party in college and decorating his childhood bedroom with a photograph of Orbán as a pro-democracy hero. His subsequent campaign featured national flags, grassroots rallies in rural Fidesz heartlands, and consistent patriotic messaging, which political analysts described as a strategic choice and not a stylistic coincidence.

The European Union, which has frozen billions of euros in funding for Hungary since 2022 due to concerns about democratic backsliding under Orbán, is expected to release those funds once Magyar's government submits anti-corruption legislation. Magyar has said this will happen on his first day in office, a timeline his party confirmed was not borrowed from any previous Hungarian government's infrastructure commitments.

Political scientist Abel Bojar told NPR that Magyar's victory was "truly unprecedented" while also noting that critics questioned whether he would follow through on promises to redemocratize the country. "I'm not in a position right now to give you a yes or no answer," Bojar said, in remarks that European leaders did not include in their congratulatory statements.

Orbán, who conceded defeat within three hours of polls closing, said the result was "painful but unambiguous" and that he would continue to serve Hungary from opposition. He did not specify whether this would involve the same state media apparatus, party funding infrastructure, and rural political network that Magyar used to defeat him.