Trump Considers Sanctions Relief for Hungary as Orban Pushes Energy Plea at White House
US President, Donald Trump has hinted at the possibility of exempting Hungary from Washington’s sanctions on Russian oil following an appeal from Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban during his visit to the White House on Friday.
The meeting marked Orban’s first official trip to Washington since Trump’s return to office and came shortly after Budapest offered to host a peace summit between Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, a proposal later shelved.
Speaking to reporters, Trump said he was open to reviewing Hungary’s request, citing the country’s geographical disadvantage.
“We are looking at it because it is very difficult for him to get the oil and gas from other areas. As you know, they don’t have the advantage of having a sea,” Trump explained.
The United States had recently imposed sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, as part of renewed pressure on Moscow to end its nearly four-year invasion of Ukraine.
Hungary, which relies heavily on Russian energy imports, has been one of the few EU members to resist the bloc’s efforts to curb dependency on Moscow.
Orban defended his position during the meeting, saying Hungary’s energy realities left little room for alternatives.
“Because we are supplied by pipelines. Pipeline is not an ideological or political issue. It’s a physical reality because we don’t have ports,” he said.
The Hungarian leader, who arrived with a six-member ministerial delegation, added that he needed to “achieve results” regarding the sanctions, noting their potential impact on Hungarian citizens.
Trump, who has previously praised Orban for his hard-line stance on migration, used the occasion to urge European Union leaders to “respect Hungary and respect this leader very, very strongly because he’s been right on immigration.”
Orban’s latest outreach to Trump, whom he described as a “dear friend,” follows several private visits to the US president’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida. However, the new US administration’s trade policies have had mixed implications for Hungary.
While Washington lifted sanctions on Orban’s top aide, Antal Rogan, and reinstated Hungary’s visa waiver status, Trump’s tariffs on EU goods have hit the country’s car exports hard amid ongoing economic stagnation.
Analysts say Orban’s visit is as much about optics as outcomes.
Daniel Hegedus, Central Europe director at the German Marshall Fund, suggested that Trump might offer the Hungarian leader a symbolic concession.
“There surely will be some kind of symbolic result that can be communicated by both parties,” Hegedus noted, adding that Trump “has already proved he is willing to help out his ideological allies.”
Orban, who faces a tough election next spring after 15 years in power, has positioned himself as a nationalist voice within the EU, often clashing with Brussels over migration, rule-of-law disputes, and Ukraine’s EU membership bid.
If Trump grants even a partial exemption on the Russian oil sanctions, analysts believe it could hand Orban a domestic political boost while reinforcing the perception of a deepening alliance between Washington and one of Europe’s most controversial leaders.
