Hungary’s New Leader Calls Out State Media In Tense TV Faceoff: ‘Factory Of Lies’

On Apr 17, 2026

Hungarian Prime Minister-elect Péter Magyar took to state-controlled media outlets on Wednesday to tell them they’ll soon be booted off the air in a defiant message against what he called the “propaganda machine.”

Magyar — whose opposition party, Tisza, brought the 16-year rule of Hungary’s autocratic leader Viktor Orbán to an end in a crushing election defeat this week — has been a frequent critic of state media in the country, where backers of Orbán’s Fidesz party are estimated to control a vast majority of outlets overall.

“What has been happening here since 2010 is something that Goebbels or the North Korean leadership would admire — not a single true word being spoken,” said Magyar, per a translation from Euronews, in a tense, in-studio interview with M1.

“This cannot continue.”

Magyar, in a clip from the TV interview shared by X user @JayinKyiv, accused M1 of barring him from appearing on the air and knocked the network for insulting him, his family and his loved ones.

“In any case, I can tell you that we have no personal resentment,” Magyar said.

“But one of the elements of our program is that this factory of lies will end after the formation of the Tisza government is formed,” he added.

pic.twitter.com/eRBlQX2I3F

— Jay in Kyiv (@JayinKyiv) April 15, 2026

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Long unofficially banned from appearing on state TV, incoming Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar appears on a channel to which he was previously not allowed only to announce an end of “North Korean” style Orban media monopoly. pic.twitter.com/eRBlQX2I3F

— Jay in Kyiv (@JayinKyiv) April 15, 2026

The M1 host claimed the outlet had invited Magyar and members of his party to appear multiple times and denied talk of the network insulting his family.

The prime minister-elect — in a separate appearance on Kossuth Rádió — remarked that “every Hungarian deserves a public service media that broadcasts the truth.”

Elsewhere, Magyar took to X, where he declared that Hungarians have “just witnessed the last days of a propaganda machine” before vowing to suspend the outlets until their “public service character is restored” after his government is set to be sworn in sometime in mid-May.