FLASH
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The second round is a runoff between the two candidates who won the most votes from the first round.
Donald Trump, the 47th president of the United States, and MAGA could prove decisive in the outcome of the presidential election in Romania.
The far-right's leading candidate for Romania's presidency thinks that rapprochement with the US president is still a winning ticket ahead of Sunday's elections.
George Simion, who proudly wears Trump baseball caps, spoke to Politico shortly after a visit to Washington, where he conducted interviews with podcast host and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon and far-right activist Jack Posobiec.
"We are the natural allies of the Republican Party and we are in full ideological alignment with the MAGA movement," Simion said, referring to his party, the Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR).
For the Trump camp, especially JD Vance and Elon Musk, the Romanian elections have become a cause célèbre after they were dramatically overturned last December.
While Romanian authorities said they were forced to cancel the process due to suspected election interference and "aggressive" hybrid attacks by Russia, the far right has accused them of subverting democracy because they could not accept the first-round victory of Calin Georgescut, an ardent nationalist and Kremlin sympathizer.
The first round of re-election will be on May 4, with a second on May 18. If he wins the presidency, the 38-year-old Simion has pledged to give a senior role to Georgescu, who was barred from running again.
"We are now in a campaign to restore democracy, the will of the people, the rule of law and constitutional order," Simion said.
AUR is a conservative party with an irredentist view of rebuilding a greater Romania, raising the possibility of territorial disputes and potential clashes with Ukraine, Moldova and Bulgaria. While he denies being pro-Russian, Simion wants to stop military aid to Ukraine.
Founded in 2019, AUR ranks as the second largest parliamentary party, behind the center-left Social Democratic Party (PSD). Simion came fourth in last year's canceled presidential race, but now appears to have gained support among Georgescu voters.
The situation in Romania is being monitored internationally and it is not yet known how much resonance Simioni's statements as a "Trumpist" may have with the electorate. What is seen with fear so far is that a victory for Simioni could destabilize a key NATO and EU member country with 19 million inhabitants.
Simion is on track to win the first round with about 29 percent of the vote, according to a Politico poll. If he wins on May 4, much will depend on whether voters support the second-place candidate, who is likely to be either former National Liberal Party (PNL) leader Crin Antonescu (with 22 percent) or Bucharest mayor Nicușor Dan (20 percent).
The second round is a runoff between the two candidates who won the most votes from the first round.
Inside Romania, Simion is under investigation for trying to lobby through a company with a $1.5 million contract to secure meetings with key American political figures and to organize media appearances with U.S.-based journalists. The controversy has centered on whether AUR may have used money given by the state to political parties for this promotional project.
Simion has insisted that the document setting out such an agreement was not a contract, but a letter of intent. However, Romania's Permanent Electoral Authority said on April 24 that it would investigate the party's financing.
Antonescu accused Simioni of investing "in his cult of personality and in conspirators known abroad. Instead of fighting for Romania, he chooses to pay someone else, there, to humiliate us all."
Simion also hopes to capitalize on the support Georgescu built up last year by saying there will be a job for him, perhaps even as prime minister.
"I think this is the normal thing for him to take the role he wants. Because he is the Romanian who received the most votes, he is the person who should have taken the role in Cotroceni [the presidential palace] and it is a way to return to normality and to fix everything that can still be fixed, because democracy and Romanians' faith in the rule of law were seriously wounded," Simion said.
In the current chamber, AUR is in opposition, while the PSD socialists and PNL liberals are part of the governing majority. Antonescu is their joint candidate.
However, Simion argues that if Antonescu does not perform well, the coalition parties will have to accept a new prime minister and dismiss Marcel Ciolacu, the current prime minister.
The far right has capitalized on long-standing frustrations in Romania over the corruption and ineffectiveness of the political establishment - the PSD and the PNL - which it has accused of orchestrating the annulment of the election. Last year's presidential election was the first time in Romania's post-communist history that a candidate from the establishment parties failed to advance to the second round.
"The government organized the campaign and the elections and lost the elections," Simion said of last year's vote.
But he also faces charges of violating election rules.
Several Romanians who received personal letters from Simion recently complained to Romania’s electoral authorities about a possible violation of GDPR rules on the use of personal data. A regional electoral authority then sent a complaint to prosecutors, as reported by the ProTV channel. Simion responded that his party had access to the electoral register, which contains the data of Romanians eligible to vote, and said that many of the people in it were dead.
Persona non grata
Simion, who has been banned from entering Ukraine and neighboring Moldova because of his past campaign to reclaim part of their territory, said he prayed that Trump would find a way to bring peace to Ukraine.
The war presents a dilemma for Simion. Although he is a nationalist who supports MAGA in letting Ukraine fend for itself, he is much less inclined than Trump to publicly support Russia. In fact, Simion presents himself as the candidate who can keep the US committed to stationing troops in Romania.
"What we want, as a country affected by German and Russian imperialism in history, is for this peace formula to come with new security guarantees for the next 30 to 50 years, so that Russia does not do what it did again, violating all international treaties," Simion said.
While competitors in last year's elections accused him of wanting to take Romania out of the EU, Simion has insisted that he wants his country to remain a member, but that the bloc should focus only on the economy and not interfere in culture and defense.
Simioni also stressed that he wanted Romania to remain in NATO, led by the US.
"I do not believe that a defense force led by France and Great Britain can be an alternative to the security solution that has worked since World War II, the Pax Americana formula," Simion said, referring to a new security architecture for Europe and especially post-war Ukraine.
Instead, he said, NATO countries should do as Trump demands by increasing their military spending.
"All countries should increase this spending; I think it's right to pay for your own security and invest in your own security," he said. /Adapted from Politico Pamphlet/
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