Fringe Political Operatives Meet, Howl, Avoid Media
Michael Hedges May 10, 2023 - Follow on Twitter
Political parties, lobbyists and advocates regularly hold meetings and conferences to ramp up enthusiasm, not to forget money. There are speeches, workshops and, of course, meet-and-greet sessions, sometimes with food and beverages. Banners abound, big-screen TVs light up the rooms and security guards watch over the big-wigs. Organizers are very professional. News coverage is highly controlled.
 The US-based stridently right-wing advocacy group Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) held a special event last week in Budapest, Hungary. There was scant interest from major news outlets both in Europe and elsewhere. Independent Hungarian news media was at least amused. CPAC has long espoused press freedom but only for right-leaning outlets.
At the end of last week an incident jumped out, first reported by Hungarian media news portal Media1 (May 5), about a reporter representing the mainstream UK news outlet the Guardian being removed from the event and her interview subject hustled away. Free-lance correspondent Flora Garamvolgyi, who also contributes to the RFE/RL Hungarian service, was able to register for the two-day event, boarded an airplane and meandered through the conference venue, pass dangling from her neck. The entry to the venue was adorned with ‘No Woke Zone’, which some noted bore a resemblance to the infamous ‘Arbeit macht frei’ gate at extermination camps.
Seated for an interview with former US senator Rick Santorum, she was approached by security guards and told to leave. The accreditation had been issued in error. Mr. Santorum was hustled away mid-sentence. When asked, a CPAC official said only that orders for the actions “came from above,” without further clarification other than a “system error” originally allowed her entry.
By coincidence, the next conference session subject was press freedom. CPAC Hungary was hosted by the Center for Fundamental Rights, a right-wing think tank financially supported by the government of prime minister Viktor Orban. CPAC chairperson and president of the American Conservative Union Matt Schlapp thanked the Center for Fundamental Rights for illuminating the means for eliminating critical news coverage and said the group had decided to “go Hungarian” in deciding “who is a journalist and who is not a journalist,” reported AP (May 4). For the first iteration of CPAC Hungary last year, several mainstream news organizations, including the New York Times (NYT) and Associated Press (AP), were banned from the event.
Seemingly totally related, news portal Politico published a piece (May 6) about its reporter Jacob Heilbrunn being denied access to the CPAC Hungary venue. Media1 reporter Balázs Gulyás was denied registration ahead of the conference. The International Press Institute (IPI) responded to the “shameful” event as “clearly revenge for critical reporting.”
“Enmity towards the media has been a constant theme at CPAC’s Hungarian iteration,” wrote Ms Garamvolgyi for the Guardian (May 5). “This year, most independent journalists were refused accreditation for the event, held in a country where the IPI has said media freedom “remains suffocated.” This years CPAC Hungary was filled with far-right politicians from the US and Europe, many failed second-stringers. Harping about critical news coverage is their raison d’etre.
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