Tisza Party

The Respect and Freedom Party, commonly known by its Hungarian abbreviations Tisza Party and TISZA, is a conservative, centre-right, pro-European, and populist political party in Hungary. It has been the governing party since the 2026 general election. Tisza was founded in 2020. It was a minor, extraparliamentary party until 2024, when former Fidesz member and political activist Péter Magyar joined the party in the wake of the Katalin Novák presidential pardon scandal (Hungarian: kegyelmi ügy). Tisza became the electoral vehicle for Magyar's "Stand Up Hungarians Community," members of which assumed a majority of positions in the party's presidium and elected Magyar president in July 2024. Tisza contested the 2024 European Parliament election, netting 7 seats, and the 2026 general election, in which it won a two-thirds supermajority, sufficient to amend the Fundamental Law without the support of other parliamentary parties and ending 16 consecutive years of Fidesz government. Eszter Lakos and Andrea Bujdosó serve as Tisza's leaders in the European Parliament and the National Assembly, respectively. A member of the European People's Party Group, the party has been described as conservative, liberal-conservative, conservative-liberal, and populist. It is pro-European and atlanticist, favoring closer ties with the European Union and NATO and adoption of the Euro. Tisza supports anti-corruption measures and is critical of the "System of National Cooperation" (Hungarian: Nemzeti Együttműködés Rendszere or NER), the governance strategy of clientelism and institutional capture developed by Fidesz. Tisza accordingly supports increased judicial independence, Hungary's rejoining the European Public Prosecutor's Office, the popular election of the President of the Republic, and term limits for prime ministers and members of the National Assembly.