Romania: The battle for elections Georgescu’s disqualification sparks major protests

Mass protests erupted in Bucharest after Romania’s Central Electoral Bureau (CEB) disqualified opposition politician Călin Georgescu from the presidential race on 9 March. Demonstrators gathered outside the CEB building, chanting “We voted, you stole,” before storming the premises. In response, gendarmes were forced to use tear gas against the protesters.

The scandal surrounding Romania’s presidential elections began back in December 2024, when the country’s Constitutional Court annulled the results of the first round of voting. In that round, Elena Lasconi, the candidate from the liberal Save Romania Union (USR) party, secured 19.18% of the vote, while independent candidate Călin Georgescu received 22.94%. Candidates from other mainstream parties, including the National Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party, performed poorly. Their nominees, who garnered 8.79% and 19.15% of the vote respectively, failed to advance to the second round.

In their ruling, the judges referred to classified intelligence materials suggesting that the opposition candidate had been secretly supported by Russia. It was also noted that Georgescu’s success was largely due to his dominance on TikTok, where he had an advantage over his competitors. This was somewhat true, as unlike the establishment candidates, who spent millions of lei on their campaigns, Georgescu primarily conducted his electoral campaign on social media.

The Constitutional Court's decision was welcomed by liberal party representatives and the European Union. As The Guardian reported: “Possessing ample accumulated evidence of foul play, the Romanian authorities had no good options. […] But as Russia strives with increasing determination to undermine the practice of democracy in neighbouring states and beyond, Bucharest was right to draw a line in the sand.”

In addition to the annulment of the election results, six criminal cases were opened against Călin Georgescu, including charges of illegal financing of his electoral campaign. The Russian military attaché was also expelled from the country.

The position of the Romanian authorities and the European Union is vulnerable in that it fails to explain why such serious allegations were brought against Călin Georgescu not before the election campaign, but only after he unexpectedly became the frontrunner in the race. It is also difficult to explain the “Russian connection” in the case of an outsider candidate, who used only social media for his promotion, yet managed to garner millions of votes.

The most likely explanation for Georgescu's success lies in voter dissatisfaction with the traditional parties. Klaus Iohannis's decade-long presidency was marred by corruption, scandals, crises, and austerity policies. According to Transparency International, 45% of Romanians surveyed stated that they believed the level of corruption in the country had increased in 2023. Another 20% admitted that they had to pay a bribe to access government services in 2023. It is likely that Iohannis, even with a sense of relief, was preparing to hand over power to his coalition partner from the Social Democratic Party, had "unaware" voters not preferred an outsider over the traditional parties.

In addition, this year, the Romanian government allocated $20.7 billion for defense. These funds were taken from spending on healthcare, education, transportation, and pensions. Romanians are not willing to pay such a high price for security.

In one of his videos, which garnered 6.5 million views, Georgescu stated: “Neither my supporters nor the Romanian people are interested in Putin or Ukraine. [...] Our problem is our country. Over 20% of people in this country live in poverty. Do you know how many 13-14-year-olds are using drugs in our country? That’s a real problem. 10% is a huge number.” In another video, the opposition candidate remarked: “Why aren’t you talking about the problems of the Romanian people, about poverty, about issues faced by people with disabilities, about people who have to sell their kidneys [for money]?” According to the latest polls, Georgescu is expected to receive between 40% and 45% of the vote in the first round of the runoff election, giving him a real chance of becoming Romania’s president.

Notably, 62-year-old Călin Georgescu is far from just an anti-poverty advocate. He is a supporter of far-right views. In his TikTok videos, the "people's candidate" presents himself as a nationalist and devout Christian, a faithful son of the Orthodox Church promoting conservative values. Georgescu has repeatedly praised the dictator Ion Antonescu, who ruled the country during World War II, and the fascist Iron Guard, which was responsible for terror and anti-Semitic pogroms.

Meanwhile, the campaign against Georgescu has gone beyond reasonable limits, as evidenced by the arrest of 101-year-old Major General of the Air Force Radu Theodoru. The veteran and his five "accomplices" were accused of planning a coup d'état, which was supposed to overthrow the current government. Instead of Romania, the "old bandits" were said to have planned to establish a new state called "Geția," governed by the "Vlad Țepeș Committee," the National Information Center, and a Council of Elders made up of 13 individuals. For each Romanian elder, there would be 10 members of the Council of Elders, and each of the 130 elders would be responsible for 10 members of local executive committees. Teodor himself was assigned the title of "Marshal of Rumaniism."

Furthermore, the "conspirators" intended to publish lists of grant recipients from the Soros Foundation and USAID, attended events at the Russian Embassy, planned to exit NATO, declare the country's neutrality, restore relations with Russia, China, and Iran, and negotiate with Moscow over the denunciation of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact.

After the Central Electoral Bureau's ruling, Georgescu wrote in English on the social media platform X: "A direct blow to the heart of democracy worldwide! I have one message left! If democracy in Romania falls, the entire democratic world will fall! This is just the beginning. It’s that simple! Europe is now a dictatorship, Romania is under tyranny!" His opposition was also supported by the new leadership in the United States. Elon Musk called the decision to ban Georgescu from running in the elections "crazy." Earlier, speaking at the Munich Security Conference, U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance highlighted the situation in Romania, questioning Brussels' commitment to democratic principles: "Now, as I understand it, the argument was that Russian disinformation had infected the Romanian elections, but I’d ask my European friends to have some perspective. You can believe it’s wrong for Russia to buy social media advertisements to influence your elections. We certainly do. You can condemn it on the world stage even. But if your democracy can be destroyed with a few hundred thousand dollars of digital advertising from a foreign country, then it wasn’t very strong to begin with."

No one believes that the frontrunner in the election will be able to defend his right to participate in the elections through legal means, meaning that the political crisis in Romania is far from over.