Hungarian Presenter Fired After Caller Suggests Sniper To ‘Eliminate’ PM Magyar

by Stefan J. Bos, Worthy News Europe Bureau Chief

BUDAPEST, HUNGARY (Worthy News) – A Hungarian television and radio presenter has been fired after failing to immediately cut off a live caller who suggested using a sniper to “eliminate” Prime Minister Péter Magyar, amid wider concerns over violent political rhetoric in Hungary.

Presenter Nóra Palányi lost her job after the caller made the remarks during Tuesday’s Paláver phone-in program, jointly broadcast by HírTV and HírFM.

The woman first suggested that 300 to 400 “true Hungarians” should go to parliament and “clean out” politicians from Magyar’s Tisza Party — “but not with a broom” — according to Hungarian media accounts of the broadcast.

She then asked why Hungary did not have a “sniper” or a “good marksman” who could “eliminate” Magyar, while also saying she did not have murderous intentions.

Palányi attempted at points to calm the caller but did not immediately terminate the conversation when the violent remarks were made.

PRESENTER FIRED

Mediaworks, which owns HírTV and HírFM, said Palányi had committed an “extremely serious professional error” by failing to immediately interrupt the caller despite established protocol and by distancing herself from the remarks only later.

The company terminated her employment and launched an internal investigation aimed at preventing similar incidents. It also apologized to viewers, listeners and others affected.

The controversy adds to scrutiny surrounding Paláver and HírTV’s treatment of Magyar.

In April 2025, HírTV published corrections acknowledging that it had falsely reported several claims about Magyar’s alleged conduct toward underage girls at Budapest’s Ötkert nightclub.

The broadcaster acknowledged that it had falsely reported, among other claims, that Magyar made obscene propositions to underage girls and threatened the father of one of them. One of the corrected reports was specifically associated with Paláver.

EARLIER CONTROVERSY

There is no indication that the earlier reporting controversy and Tuesday’s live caller were directly connected.

The latest incident comes as Hungarian authorities and media organizations confront the consequences of increasingly confrontational political rhetoric in the country’s highly polarized public environment.

It also emerged during another turbulent week for Hungary’s political and media establishment. Police confirmed that a former state secretary had been questioned as a suspect over alleged misuse of personal data following the massive leak of information from Tisza’s mobile application.

Mediaworks had previously been fined 50 million forints, about $157,000, by Hungary’s data-protection authority after three of its publications linked to an interactive map containing personal information obtained from the Tisza data leak. The map exposed information connected to nearly 200,000 people.

Separately, prosecutors announced another major development Thursday in a corruption investigation involving state-owned bus operator Volánbusz, saying five people had now been questioned as suspects over passenger-transport contracts and bus procurements.

CORRUPTION PROBE

Investigators allege that state-owned Volán companies suffered losses of around 10 billion forints, or about $31.4 million, between 2015 and 2018 through allegedly overpriced purchases of more than 600 used buses and other transactions.

Prosecutors said suspected illegal payments in the case reached hundreds of millions of forints and, involving two suspects, billions of forints — equivalent to millions of dollars.

Hungarian billionaire businessman Dániel Jellinek and Norbert Szivek, the former chief executive of the Hungarian National Asset Management Company, were among those detained. A Budapest court Thursday ordered them held for one month pending the investigation, although their lawyers appealed the decision.

The court proceedings do not establish guilt, and Jellinek’s Indotek Group rejected the allegations against him, saying he had cooperated with authorities and committed no crime.

The cases are not directly connected, but their emergence within days of each other has intensified scrutiny of Hungary’s political, media and institutional landscape as authorities claim to pursue several high-profile investigations.