Romania’s Hard Right Falters—Can Ponta Win from the Center-Right?
They called it nationalism.
Others called it extremism. It was a movement shaped by history, sharpened by crisis, and driven by a vision of a Romania free from foreign influence.
The hard right—ultranationalist, populist, and wary of Europe—had gathered momentum. Their message was clear: sovereignty first, tradition above progress, and no interference from Brussels or Washington.
They wanted fewer immigrants. Stronger borders. A Romania that stood on its own despite being tied to the European Union and NATO.
They did not always call for withdrawal, but challenged the authority of Brussels at every turn.
They framed their fight as one against a system that had drained Romania of its power, wealth, and identity.
Some wanted to see Moldova reunified with Romania, a vision of historical justice. Others warned of Western corporations, creeping globalism, and NATO’s pressure to spend on wars that were not Romania’s to fight.
They voted against laws that would allow the military to shoot down drones from across the Danube, even as Russian strikes landed too close for comfort.
They spoke against progressive ideals—against gender-blurring policies, against liberal Romania.
They championed economic nationalism, pushing back against foreign ownership of land and industry.
Their new hero: Călin Georgescu.
The Georgescu Phenomenon
No one expected Georgescu to win. Polls dismissed him. Political analysts ignored him. Then, in late November, his face flooded Romanian social media.
TikTok videos, Facebook posts, Instagram reels—millions of views overnight. A candidate who claimed to have spent nothing on his campaign had somehow captured the country’s attention.
He cast himself as a whistleblower, a man who saw through the lies of the elite, who fought against shadowy figures controlling world affairs. He spoke about sovereignty, corruption, and unseen networks.
His campaign, running entirely online out of nowhere, built a following that translated into enough votes in a crowded field to win round one.
Georgescu won the first round with 22.9%. It was a stunning result. Elena Lasconi, a popular mayor with a centrist appeal, finished second with 19.17%. Marcel Ciolacu, the ruling party’s candidate, was just behind at 19.15%.
The race went to a runoff.
Then it fell apart.
Two days before the final vote, the Constitutional Court annulled the election ruling that Russian interference had tainted the election.
Intelligence reports described a disinformation campaign driven by AI-generated propaganda. A Russian manufactured grassroots movement. TikTok flooded with pro-Georgescu content – 85 percent AI-driven. Engagement with followers, commenters, likes, and shares was 85% fake. But it looked like a nation suddenly stood enthralled with an unknown savior: Georgescu.
A campaign organized by Moscow built on deception, Romanian intelligence said. Moscow denied it.
Prosecutors indicted Georgescu on illegal campaign financing, affiliation with antisemitic organizations, and promotion of fascist symbols. Georgescu denied it.
The Aftermath of a Cancelled Election
The Court scheduled a new election for May and banned Georgescu from running.
It was a rare move. Political voices split. The European Union supported the decision. The United States hesitated. At the Munich Security Conference, U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance called it “flimsy suspicions” driven by outside pressure.
Elon Musk wrote on X: “They just arrested the person who won the most votes in the Romanian presidential election. This is messed up.”
But Romania moved on. New candidates stepped in.
The hard right struggled to replace Georgescu.
At the heart of the replacement effort is the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), a party born in 2019, gaining ground with its rejection of European authority.
Who Will Fill the Gap?
With the loss of Georgescu, George Simion, AUR’s leader, teamed with Anamaria Gavrila from the Young People Party to keep the hard right in the presidential race.
Simion and Gavrila announced they would both submit their candidacies.
“Once our candidacies are definitively accepted, one of us will withdraw,” Gavrila said in a joint statement with Simion after a meeting with Georgescu. “We must give all chances to this movement.”
Then came Victor Ponta, a former prime minister, into the race, announcing his candidacy Wednesday.
Ponta, a former leader of the Social Democrats, has been gravitating right yet can still pick up votes from the left.
He aims to prove to Romanians that he is the acceptable alternative to Georgescu, one more experienced and rational.
On the other side, a likely opponent is Nicusor Dan, the centrist mayor of Bucharest. Dan had polled as Georgescu’s primary challenger before the Court’s decision.
Crin Antonescu, a centrist backed by Romania’s ruling coalition, is also in the race.
Ponta, who resigned as prime minister in 2015, now casts himself as an outsider. He backs the “radical change” he sees in the U.S. with the advent of Trump while supporting Romania’s role in the EU and NATO.
“Power must be returned to the people, taken back from systems, organizations, and parties that have seized it over the years,” he said as he launched his campaign. “Only through this change can we have a future both in Romania and in Europe.”
The election bureau must validate all submissions. The final candidate list is expected after Saturday’s deadline.
The Shadow of the Past
Though he courts the hard right voters, Ponta is not aligned with Georgescu on one crucial issue. He does not share the fascination of the hard right with Corneliu Zelea Codreanu, leader of Romania’s interwar Legionary Movement and founder of its paramilitary wing, the Iron Guard.
Codreanu was assassinated in 1938. His ally, Ion Antonescu, Romania’s wartime dictator, was executed in 1946 as a war criminal.
Georgescu praised Codreanu and Antonescu, calling them “heroes.”
Romania bans the glorification of fascists. It outlaws Nazi salutes.
Gerogescu stood before a crowd and raised his right arm. Was it a Nazi salute? He denied it.
They called Georgescu “the captain,” Codreanu’s old title.
Softened But Still Harbored
After the Constitutional Court canceled the election, extreme attitudes peaked. A wave of threats. Radical rhetoric.
Now that the election is moving forward, the hard right has softened the language but spreads the same message. Holocaust minimization. Legionary rehabilitation.
Ponta’s appearance – left of the hard right, nearer to the center, maybe the moderately-right voice to capture the repeated election.
Ponta has condemned antisemitism. During his tenure as Prime Minister, he emphasized Romania’s responsibility in acknowledging its role in the Holocaust and promoted efforts to combat antisemitism.
But Ponta faced criticism for his defense of a party member, Dan Șova, who denied the Holocaust. When Ponta described Șova as “ignorant, not antisemitic,” it drew backlash from Jewish communities.
Barring the rise of another Georgescu – another cutout backed by an AI-driven inundation – Ponta is well positioned.
But there is no guarantee that in the hours before the election, as it did with Geoergescu, a hundred million bots impersonated humans, delivering last-minute messages to villages, farms, cities, intellectual circles, the military, the police, priests, and media figures via social media to each with a different message.
Playing algorithms like a virtuoso, striking every chord of fear, hope, and division. The Russian way.
They say that Ponta has shifted, changed with the time – his right is not authentic. But the arrival in your social media feed in the waning hours before you cast your vote with a face of a stranger who promises you just what you want to hear, AI-contrived, is inauthentic and is why the election was canceled for candidate Georgescu.
Romania is a country of contrasts—mountains and plains, old and new, past and present, refusing to settle.
Who can bring Rumania to a place of independence and strength without forgetting its obligations to democracy, its history and traditions, and its place in Europe?
Viktor Ponta, shifting right, looks like he may be positioned, absent Russian interference, as the most likely to succeed. May 5 is the first round. May 18 is the runoff.
