Budapest's liberal mayor charged for organizing banned Pride event

BUDAPEST, Hungary (AP) — Authorities in Hungary on Wednesday filed charges against Budapest's liberal mayor over his role in organizing a banned LGBTQ+ Pride event in the capital last year.

Gergely Karácsony, who has led Budapest since 2019, had been the subject of a police investigation following the march on June 28 which went ahead despite a ban imposed by Hungary's right-wing nationalist government.

The event was the largest of its kind in the country's history, with organizers saying some 300,000 people participated.

In a statement on Wednesday, the Budapest Chief Prosecutor's Office said Karácsony had been charged for organizing the unlawful assembly despite a prohibition order. It recommended he should face a fine without a trial.

Prosecutors said Karácsony had defied the police order banning the Pride march and “repeatedly published public calls to participate in the assembly, and then led the assembly.”

A defiant Karácsony said in a written statement that he was a “proud defendant.”

“It seems that in this country, this is the price you pay if you stand up for your own freedom and the freedom of others,” he wrote. “If anyone thinks they can ban me, deter me, or prevent me and my city from doing so, they are gravely mistaken.”

Karácsony did not dispute the prosecution's depiction of his role in the march, writing: “That is exactly what happened.”

He added: "I will never accept, nor resign myself to, the idea that in my homeland it could be a crime to stand up for freedom. I will never tolerate this, and despite every threat and every punishment, I will fight it, because when people who want to live, to love, to be happy are simply betrayed by their own country, betrayed by their government, resistance is a duty.”

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán ’s ruling party passed a contentious anti-LGBTQ+ law in March 2025 which banned Pride events and allowed authorities to use facial recognition tools to identify those attending the festivities.

The populist leader’s government has insisted Pride — which is a celebration of LGBTQ+ visibility and struggle for equal rights — was a violation of children’s rights to moral and spiritual development. A constitutional amendment last year declared these rights took precedence over other fundamental protections including the right to peacefully assemble.

Orbán’s party has passed other legislation — including a 2021 law barring all content depicting homosexuality to minors under 18 — that rights groups and European politicians have decried as repressive against sexual minorities and compared to similar restrictions in Russia.