Romania’s central election authority has barred Calin Georgescu, a populist candidate and frontrunner, from participating in the upcoming presidential election re-run in May.
"Europe is now a dictatorship; Romania is under tyranny!" Georgescu stated in a post on X following the decision. "I have one message left! If democracy in Romania falls, the entire democratic world will fall!"
The Trump administration has shown interest in Romania’s presidential election, especially after it was canceled in May amid allegations of Russian collusion benefiting Georgescu.
SpaceX CEO and DOGE leader Elon Musk voiced his reaction to the decision.
"This is crazy," Musk commented on X.
Kari Lake, a senior advisor in the Trump administration for the US agency for global media, also reacted by comparing the situation in Romania to what "they tried with Trump here in America."
"Do you love your country & want to put it first?" Lake posted on X. "Then, the Globalists want you removed from the ballot & silenced. They tried it with Trump here in America. They did it to Bolsonaro in Brazil. Now, they’re doing it to Georgescu in Romania. The people should dictate their country’s future, not the international order and their captured court."
Georgescu, who won the first round of Romania’s canceled presidential election last year, was taken into custody for questioning by the country’s top prosecutors back in February.
ROMANIA ANNULS FIRST ROUND OF PRESIDENTIAL VOTE WON BY FAR-RIGHT CANDIDATE
Romania’s Constitutional Court made the unprecedented decision to annul the election two days prior to the Dec. 8 runoff after Georgescu’s first-round victory. Despite polling in single digits and declaring no campaign spending, allegations of Russian interference and electoral violations quickly surfaced. Following the election cancellation, prosecutors initiated an investigation into alleged campaign funding fraud, antisemitism, and hate speech.
The Trump administration criticized Romania for voiding last year’s presidential election, with Vice President JD Vance claiming that the court’s ruling stemmed from "flimsy suspicions" and "immense pressure" from Romania’s neighbors.
Vance stated in December, "Romania outright canceled the results of a presidential election based on flimsy suspicions from an intelligence agency and enormous pressure from its continental neighbors."
He also advised European leaders that they cannot achieve a "democratic mandate" by "censoring your opponents or imprisoning them" or by "ignoring your basic electorate on matters like who gets to be part of our shared society."
"To many of us across the Atlantic, it increasingly appears like old, entrenched interests hiding behind Soviet-era terms like misinformation and disinformation, who simply dislike the idea that someone with an alternative viewpoint might express a different opinion, or, heaven forbid, vote differently, or even worse, win an election," Vance remarked.
Georgescu, known for his strong criticism of NATO and Western backing for Ukraine, has previously sparked controversy by referring to Romanian fascist and nationalist leaders from the 1930s and 1940s as national heroes, according to The AP.
He has also previously praised Russian President Vladimir Putin as "a man who loves his country" and has referred to Ukraine as "an invented state."
