Encouraging immigration is one of the most important elements in the ideology of an open society marked by the name of the American businessman. At the beginning of the European migration crisis, in the columns of the Financial Times in 2015,
Márki-Zay defends Soros with an absurd billboard campaign
Péter Márki-Zay has recently stated that he will advertise on 400 billboards that George Soros has not settled migrants in Hungary. This is not the first time that the candidate for prime minister of the left has defended the American billionaire, as Márki-Zay said in his memorial speech on 23 October that “Regarding George Soros, they have not yet been able to prove the settlement of a single migrant”. It is important to note that the proposal package published by George Soros in 2015 calls for “safe routes to be established” for migrants, including that “they will be transported from Greece to their countries of destination”. The migration route in question would have affected Hungary as well, but the national government blocked the implementation of the plan by building a physical border barrier and strengthening border protection. For the sake of clarity, Századvég summarised the pro-immigration activities and suggestions of George Soros and the NGO network behind him.
The Soros network is committed to encouraging migration
George Soros stated in connection with the distribution mechanism for immigrants that “If they do not become permanent and mandatory features of the common European asylum system, it will fall apart”.
Then in the same year, he believed “the EU has to accept at least a million asylum seekers annually for the foreseeable future”. Soros also believed that “The EU should provide €15,000 per asylum seeker for each of the first two years to help cover housing, health care, and education costs – and to make accepting refugees more appealing to member states,” and said that the European Union should spend at least €8-10 billion annually on migration, which could be covered by a loan from the international financial markets. The American billionaire also made it clear that “our plan aims to protect immigrants, and national borders are an obstacle”. In addition,
the Open Society Foundations, by their own admission, “have provided support to organizations assisting refugees and migrants for a long time”,
in Hungary “Menedék, Hungarian Association for Migrants and the Hungarian Helsinki Committee have been provided support to provide legal assistance to migrants and asylum seekers”.
We must also remember that the Open Society Foundations also operate a program specifically supporting migrants (International Migration Initiative), which aims, among other things, to create “inclusive and integrated” societies, inter alia, by involving immigrants in city administration. It is also meaningful that in recent years the Open Society Foundations have generously supported domestic lobbying organizations that have taken a pro-immigration stance. Accordingly,
- Menedék, Hungarian Association for Migrants received a donation of $68,000 in 2016, while
- the Hungarian Helsinki Committee received a total donation of $1,510,000 between 2016 and 2019
from the Soros Foundation.
Brussels is attacking Hungary for stopping immigration
It is also important to point out that
Hungary has been under fire from critics of pro-immigration elites in Brussels for years because of its strong migration policy, based on border protection and the rejection of uncontrolled immigration.
In December 2015, the European Commission launched an infringement procedure against Hungary for Hungary’s asylum regulations and filed a lawsuit with the European Court of Justice in 2018. The latter body condemned Hungary in the case mentioned in its judgment as of 17 December 2020, and then in November 2021, Brussels decided to bring Hungary before the Court of Justice of the European Union for failure to comply with the Court ruling in relation to EU rules on asylum and return.
Thus, it can be stated that
George Soros and the lobbying organizations supported by him,
together with the forces in Brussels,
have long been pushing for a change in Hungary’s anti-immigration policy with different means and in different ways, and their efforts have possibly failed due to the resistance of the national government.
Consequently, it is easy to see that the above-mentioned billboard campaign by Péter Márki-Zay and the left is misleading.