Orbán-aligned think tank in US seeks American government funding

A foreign-policy think tank built with Hungarian state money under Viktor Orbán has developed close links to American political donors. After its Budapest funding dried up, the newly created Danube Institute USA is seeking US private sponsors, foundation grants and government support. Its network includes a veteran Republican campaign-finance operative, lawyers connected to Elon Musk and DOGE, and figures tied to major technology-sector donors.

For 16 years, Orbán’s governments used publicly funded institutions to cultivate an alliance of politicians, intellectuals and activists in the United States and Western Europe. Hungary’s change of government has left this transatlantic right-wing populist-right network uncertain, as shown by the fate of the Danube Institute.

As Átlátszó previously reported, several highly paid foreign researchers were not offered new contracts after the election, while the institute’s parent organization, the Batthyány Lajos Foundation (BLA), was affected by the abolition of Hungary’s public-interest foundation (KEKVA) structure. An attempt to reposition the institute by approaching the new government and involving more moderate conservatives failed.

The BLA and the Danube Institute are now being preserved through two parallel strategies. The foundation’s leaders argue that, because the BLA existed as a private foundation before becoming a KEKVA, it may continue in its original form. István Kiss, the Danube Institute’s executive director, said the required settlement process was under way and stressed that the Danube Institute would remain part of the BLA if the foundation survives.

The second strategy is Danube Institute USA.

Incorporated in Virginia and later using addresses in Tennessee and Texas, its board includes leaders of the Hungarian institute and American figures linked to the Orbán government’s favored think tank ecosistem: members of the board include former guest research fellows from the Matthias Corvinus Collegium, the Heritage Foundation, and the Hudson Institute. As we have also pointed out in our previous article: the new entity’s legal affairs appear to be handled by Lex Politica, a firm co-founded by Elon Musk’s lawyer.

Seeking a US State Department grant

Danube Institute USA’s website was activated after the Hungarian election, although Kiss said the idea first emerged after the 2024 US presidential election. He described it as the second “bridgehead” of an institute connecting the US and Europe. He also stressed that the US entity is legally independent from both the BLA and the Hungarian institute and has received no money from them.

Kiss said that they plan to organize eventsmainly in the United States, which they expect to fund using American private donations and foundation grants. The American Danube Institute is also interested in a US federal grant. István Kiss confirmed that Danube Institute USA intends to apply for the “Developing Civilizational Bonds, Democratic Resilience, and Rule of Law in Europe” grant announced by the State Department.

Átlátszó has previously reported on the program, which purports to offer funding for European and American oraganizations that promote national sovereignity, freedom of speech, and address mass migration; European commentators and politicians however expressed worries that the program would be used to influence elections and assist far-right parties such as Germany’s AfD.

A veteran Republican fundraiser

Based on the Danube Institute USA’s network, they may be well-suited for securing grants from the Trump administration and Republican sponsors: they developed strong connections into the American Right’s lobbying and fundraising ecosystem. Below, we provide a detailed overview of the Danube Institute USA’s network and the individuals and organizations involved in it.

Relationships between the individuals and organizations mentioned in the article. Click on the image to enlarge it.

Corporate filings name Cabell Hobbs as the organization’s treasurer. Hobbs is one of the Republican Party’s most prominent fundraiser: he has been involved in the business since George W. Bush’s 2004 campaign, after which he briefly served in Bush’s White House staff.

His name is listed in the Federal Election Commission’s database in connection with more than 85 political action committees, usually as treasurer.

Surprisingly, Hobbs has in the past worked for the PACs of Donald Trump’s Republican oppenents: he handled finances for John Bolton’s committee, later renamed the American National Security PAC, and for Never Back Down, the super PAC that raised and spent more than $100 million supporting Ron DeSantis’s unsuccessful 2024 primary campaign.

Cabell Hobbs’s name in the DI USA articles of incorporation.

By the closing phase of the 2024 election, however, Hobbs was assistant treasurer of the pro-Trump Future Coalition PAC. Its biggest donor was Building America’s Future, a nonprofit founded by Musk. The PAC drew attention for antisemitic advertisements targeting Kamala Harris’s husband over his Jewish background.

Links to Musk, Ramaswamy and DOGE

Another connection to Musk’s orbit runs through Steve Roberts, the lawyer who filed Danube Institute USA’s successful application for tax-exempt status at the IRS.

According to his LinkedIn profile, Roberts served as a legal counsel at Trump’s 2017 inauguration committee  after which he represented businessman-turned-Republican politician Vivek Ramaswamy. Roberts is listed as Ramaswamy’s lawyer in Securities and Exchange Commission filings and as the chief legal counsel to the PAC supporting Ramaswamy’s presidential campaign.

After Trump’s 2024 victory, Ramaswamy was initially picked to co-lead DOGE, the cost-cutting agency pushed by Elon Musk, but withdrew to run for governor of Ohio. According to a New York Times report, his lawyer nevertheless ended up working for DOGE, before returning to fundraising, representing the Ramaswamy’s Ohio PAC, to which Musk contributed five million dollars.

Vivek Ramaswamy at a gubernatorial campaign event. Source: vivekforohio.com

Besides DOGE and fundraising, Roberts is also an Examiner for using the Foreign Agents Registration Act against what he calls the “Soros network”. This is ironic given his association with the Danube Institute, as the original think tank was funded by a foreign government, and its research fellows were often paid publish in American outlets, influencing public opinion in the US.

While DI fellows have so far not registered in the FARA database, other public figures paid by the Hungarian government can be found there. Átlátszó reported in 2023 that consultant David Reaboi had to register under FARA after performing communications services for the Hungarian embassy in Washington DC. Policy Impact Strategic Communications, the PR-company led by Tucker Carlson’s father was also registered after getting paied by the embassy to get Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó interviewed on Carlson’s TV show.

Roberts now works at Lex Politica, founded by Musk lawyer Chris Gober after DOGE was shut down.

Tax documents list the firm’s Texas address as Danube Institute USA’s contact address, suggesting it represents the organization.

In the 2026 election cycle, Gober is running for Texas’s 10th congressional seat. He has been endorsed by, among others, the American Mission PAC, which distributed a campaign video on his behalf.

American Mission is an arm of the larger Leading the Future PAC, whose main sponsor is the tech investment firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). Leading the Future describes itself as a technology-industry campaign organization seeking to elect pro-artificial-intelligence candidates at state and federal level.

Old and new figures in the network

British journalist John O’Sullivan, who chaired the Hungarian Danube Institute, also holds a leadership role in the US organization. A former member of Margaret Thatcher’s staff, he later worked at the Heritage Foundation, an official partner of the Budapest institute that jointly organized the Danube Geopolitical Summit events.

Another board member is John Fonte, formerly a fellow of both the Danube Institute and the MCC, and a leading figure at the Hudson Institute’s Center for American Common Culture. Through Fonte, Danube Institute USA may gain access to the Republican Party’s traditional Neoconservative wing, as Hudson backs a hard line toward China and Russia and continued support for Ukraine, positions differing sharply from Orbán-era rhetoric. Despite Fonte’s involvement,

there are signs that DI USA will continue to promote ties with Russia and China: its website has a section on the concept of “connectivity”.

Promoted by Balázs Orbán, connectivity has been described as the cornerstone of the Orbán government’s foreign policy: it entails opposition to the formation of “geopolitical blocks”, arguing that for Hungary to succeed, it had to have strong ties to Eastern powers. In practice, “Connectivity” was the justification for promoting Chinese investment, and antagonizing Ukraine after the full-scale Russian invasion.

Christopher DeMuth, another board member and a former Hudson Institute fellow, is now closer to the Trumpist wing through the Edmund Burke Foundation. Similarly to the aims of Orbán’s transatlantic network, the Burke Foundation aims to connect the American and European populist right. The group is best known for the National Conservatism Conferences, which Orbán attended the 2024. The event, which was held in Brussels, was co-organized by MCC.

Patrick Deneen (center) with Viktor Orbán in Budapest. Source: Zoltán Fischer / Press Office of the Prime Minister / MTI

Patrick Deneen, a University of Notre Dame professor and another board member, has followed a similar path. Once mentioned as a possible future presidential candidate, he has visited Hungary repeatedly and met Orbán in 2019. His book Regime Change: Toward a Postliberal Future was published and promoted in Hungary by MCC. Politico has listed Deneen among the thinkers who shaped JD Vance’s worldview, while Deneen told the Hungarian Conservative that Vance was well placed to inherit the transformation of American conservatism.

It remains unclear whether Danube Institute USA has secured an American sponsor, either among private donors or through the State Department program. But its network connects it to the US think-tank world, rival Republican factions, campaign-finance professionals, Musk’s circle and major technology donors — giving the transplanted Orbán-era institution a potentially strong position in its search for funding.