You shouldn't be surprised that Trump praised Viktor Orban. But you should be angry

On Monday afternoon, Donald Trump met with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who, despite leading his country since 2010 (and a previous term that ended in 2002), had yet to receive a formal audience with a US president. That’s not an accidental oversight: so severe has the criticism been against Orbán over allegations of corruption and abuses against the press and marginalized communities that in his previous visits to the United States, Presidents Bush and Obama declined to meet with him. And yet, for anyone paying attention to this administration, it’s hardly surprising. Giving access to troubling anti-LGBTQ, anti-press, anti-freedom leaders is Trump’s modus operandi. It’s a defining characteristic of his presidency.

After persistent paid lobbying from former Congressman Connie Mack over the past 18 months, Trump rolled out the red carpet for the strongman, who has been rebuked by everyone from German Chancellor Angela Merkel to European Commission Presidents José Manuel Barroso and Jean-Claude Juncker. Sitting side-by-side in the Oval Office, Trump described Orbán as a “tough man”, adding “but he is a respected man” and “a highly respected leader all over Europe, a little bit controversial maybe but that’s OK. You’re doing a great job to keep your country safe.”

Unsurprisingly, that assessment is at odds with the cold reception of Orbán’s regime by European leaders, notably due to his persistent attacks on civil liberties. In 2011, he championed the adoption of amendments to the national constitution that, among other things, limited coverage of political campaigns to state media and diminished the power of their Constitutional Court to strike down laws enshrined in the constitution, theoretically permitting a controlled legislative body to forever alter existing power structures with no oversight or accountability.

Among those amendments was one ordering the state to give preference to “traditional” relationships, i.e. families led by a marriage between a man and a woman. In 2015, Orbán, when asked about the European-wide International Day Against Homophobia, said that Hungary is a “serious nation” and that “does not mean that we would apply the same rules for people whose lifestyle is different from our own. We differentiate between them and us.” He was, however, considerate enough to praise LGBTQ people in Hungary for not engaging in “provocative behavior against which numerous European nations are struggling”. In 2017, he welcomed the notoriously anti-LGBTQ group World Congress of Families, deemed a “hate group” by the Southern Poverty Law Center for its relentless propaganda that has led to an increase in discrimination against LGBTQ people in Russia and other countries.

Orban’s friend Jair Bolsonaro, the recently elected President of Brazil, was welcomed at the White House in March by Trump, who called him “the Donald Trump of South America” and stated: “I think Brazil’s relationship with the United States, because of our friendship, is probably better than it’s ever been by far.”

Bolsonaro campaigned on a platform specifically against women’s rights, LGBTQ equality, and racial justice. He has remarked that he’d rather have a son who is dead or deals drugs than one who is gay. Last month, when it was announced Bolsonaro would receive an award in New York from the Brazilian-American Chamber of Commerce, the swift backlash led by LGBTQ media organization GLAAD was so intense that several corporate sponsors, including Delta Airlines and Bain & Company, dropped out, forcing Bolsonaro to cancel his trip.

In 2017, Trump hosted Turkish President Recep Erdoğan, an event that made international headlines when Erdoğan’s security guards brutally attacked a group of peaceful protestors outside the Turkish ambassador’s residence in downtown DC, inflicting injury on 11 people and drawing widespread condemnation, including from the Washington Post’s editorial board. Not that Erdoğan or his henchmen much cared, as this is merely business as usual under his regime in Turkey. His time leading the country has seen a notable decrease in press freedom and civil liberties, with the Press Freedom Index ranking the country as low as 154th out of 179 countries surveyed. LGBTQ advocates calling for equal recognition under the law were publicly rejected by government officials. In 2017, Erdoğan declared LGBTQ equality to be “against the values of our nation” and imposed a ban on all LGBTQ cultural events in the capital of Ankara.

So, no, anyone bothering to pay the slightest attention to Trump’s troubling track record in foreign policy is not surprised that yet another hateful figure has been invited into a White House bathed in rainbow lights to commemorate the legalization of same-sex marriage only four years ago. This is the impetuous, mediocre, infantile nature of Donald Trump: constantly drawn to the whims of other fragile bullies, no matter how bad their transgressions against the most vulnerable among humanity, let alone the health of democratic freedoms.

And for a small-minded president who has used his time in office to constantly attack LGBTQ people and the press, and frequently joked about usurping the democratic process to assume the mantle of a dictator, it is a dark reminder of where our country could be headed if he isn’t stopped.