Hungary's PM nominates Judit Polgar for presidency (Update: Polgar declines)

by Albert Silver
7/20/2026 – In an astonishing move, a day after Hungarian President Tamas Sulyok signed a ​constitutional amendment that ends ⁠his term as head of state, Prime Minister Peter Magyar announced on Sunday that he would ask Judit Polgar, the greatest female chess player of all time, to take up the mantle of interim president.| Photo: Judit Polgar Facebook page
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Update (20 July)

In a Facebook post, Judit Polgar declined the invitation, emphasising her being honoured for the invitation, though noting that she does not feel "strong enough to take on the historical responsibility of uniting a divided nation". The full post:

I consider it an honour of my life to be invited by the initiators to the position of President of the Republic, and I am extremely grateful for it.

I appreciate the Prime Minister's gesture, as despite the party's significant parliamentary weight, he has nominated an independent candidate for the President of the Republic, above parties.

However, I do not feel strong enough to take on the historical responsibility of uniting a divided nation, so I cannot accept the invitation.

I will support a new, independent and recognised President of the Republic in every possible way to achieve these goals.

The news was first announced on the official Facebook page of the Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar (Ed: Magyar literally translates to 'Hungarian' in English).

And on it he posted the following on Sunday evening:

The English translation states:

Our country needs unity, peace, and a president every Hungarian can be proud of. The office of President of the Republic is not a profession or a job, but the highest form of service. The president’s duty is to serve and represent. Every Hungarian.

Judit Polgár, who was nominated today for President of the Republic by respected figures in Hungarian public life, is such a person. That is why I will meet with her tomorrow and ask whether she is prepared to serve our country in a new role until the adoption of the new Constitution.

For decades, the name Judit Polgár has been synonymous with talent and perseverance. As the most successful female player in the history of chess, she led the women’s world rankings continuously for 26 years, while also reaching the top ten in the overall world rankings.

She is a five-time Chess Olympiad champion, an international grandmaster, and a recipient of the Hungarian Order of Saint Stephen. Her extraordinary life story was recently featured in the documentary The Queen of Chess. A few weeks ago, she was also elected a member of Christ’s College at the University of Cambridge.

Judit Polgár’s career has always been defined by achievement. The recognition she has earned is due not to political affiliations or connections, but to her exceptional talent, diligence, extraordinary resilience, and integrity. She is a Hungarian whose accomplishments command respect and admiration both at home and around the world.

Personally, I would consider it a tremendous honor if she accepted the nomination.

This has since been reported and confirmed by Reuters and other news outlets.

Link

In this video course, experts (Pelletier, Marin, Müller and Reeh) examine the games of Judit Polgar. Let them show you which openings Polgar chose to play, where her strength in middlegames were, or how she outplayed her opponents in the endgame.

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Topics: breaking news, Hungary, Judit Polgar, President
Born in the US, he grew up in Paris, France, and after college moved to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He had a peak rating of 2240 FIDE, and was a key designer of Chess Assistant 6. In 2010 he joined the ChessBase family as an editor and writer at ChessBase News. He is also a passionate photographer with work appearing in numerous publications, and the content creator of the YouTube channel, Chess & Tech as well as the author of Typing Tomes, a powerful typing program.
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5/27/2026 – On Tuesday, 5 May 2026, on the sidelines of the Super Rapid and Blitz tournament in Warsaw, a very special event took place. The Polish Minister of Finance and Economy, Andrzej Domanski, met the legendary Judit Polgar. They discussed how chess can be made accessible to all. And following the discussion, they also played a game of chess. Check out the encounter to see how strong the Minister actually is! | Photo: ChessBase India
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The touch-move controversy between Judit Polgar and Garry Kasparov

2/10/2026 – Netflix launched a new documentary on the life of Judit Polgar, "The Queen of Chess". The documentary is extremely well-made and is definitely worth a watch if you are a chess fan. It brought back to life an incident that had happened 32 years ago in 1994, when an 18-year-old Judit took on the world number-one Garry Kasparov for the first time. It involved a famous touch-move incident. | Photo: <a href="http://www.thejpcf.com/">Judit Polgar Chess Foundation</a>
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mc1483 mc1483 7/24/2026 02:11
@lajosarpad: just say you are an Orban supporter. You are the only one who commented by making it political, while Albert Silver's news was not (also you are completely off-topic).
lajosarpad lajosarpad 7/22/2026 08:35
@Mc1483 I do have a right to support whomever I wish which is a complete off-topic. Our topic is that Judit Polgár was proposed to become the president and she declined. I think she did not want to occupy the position of an autocratically removed president. It is not a matter of political opinions that it is autocratic to change the constitution in order to state that the current president loses office. It is not how things are supposed to be. If Orbán was so bad, then it is not necessary to modify the constitution so the Hungarians will not be allowed to elect him if they wish to do so. Magyar should govern well, his policy should flourish the Hungarian economy and then, if he is successful and the Hungarian people want to reelect him, then they will do so. No need for petty machinations to restrict the rights for voting nor to autocratically remove presidents. If Polgár was to accept presidency in these circumstances, then she inherits an unenviable position which is hard to resolve. It is wise that she declined, albeit I would have supported her if she was to become president.
mc1483 mc1483 7/22/2026 12:59
@lajosarpad: just say you are an Orban supporter, and save words and precious time. Your included.
Grandmaster Grandmaster 7/21/2026 07:37
Queen's Gambit declined!!
Denix Denix 7/21/2026 11:42
One of the best moves a government can make. Congratulations for the nomination!
Frederic Frederic 7/21/2026 01:09
You know that Judit declined. “I do not feel enough strength within me to take on the historic responsibility of uniting a divided nation, ​so I am unable to accept the request,” she said. Such a pity -- I'd have loved to see her represent her country.
lajosarpad lajosarpad 7/21/2026 01:06
@e-mars, I stand corrected, thanks for the clarification about UK. With this in mind, my joke about not being in the stone age is suboptimal. I certainly did not mean it offensively, I beg your pardon if it was offensive.
Frederic Frederic 7/21/2026 01:03
@e-mars: According to the Hungarian constitution (the "Fundamental Law"), the president is both nominated and elected by the National Assembly, rather than by a direct public vote. To be eligible for nomination, the candidate must be a Hungarian citizen at least 35 years old. The National Assembly electton is by secret ballot and requires a two-thirds supermajority of all MPs in the first round. If no candidate achieves this, a runoff is held between the top two candidates, which is decided by a simple majority. The president is elected to a five-year term and may be re-elected only once.
lajosarpad lajosarpad 7/21/2026 12:47
@Fritz Fritschy A Prime Minister changing the constitution in order to force the President to step down because he does not like him is an authoritarian procedure, because the Prime Minister violates the principles of checks and balances and the principles outlined by Montesquieu and, with the claim that the President is bad he is about to hand-pick a successor to him. The President should be the person who rejects laws when they are bad, so if the Prime Minister hand-picks who the president should be, then there is a danger that the president will be a yes-man to this person, especially if the Prime Minister can't wait for the mandate of the President to end. The mandate of a president is of 5 years and the mandate of a Prime Minister is of 4 years. That's intentional precisely because when a new power emerges, if said power is misusing its force, then the President and the Main Prosecutor are to be the checks and balances. And, surprise, the new Prime Minister seeks to remove these two persons. Yet, they were put in position by a previous parliamental majority which was just as legitimate as the current one. FIDESZ and Orbán were elected again and again for 16 years because in said period that was the will of the majority, so the mandates given in that period should not be artificially ended by the current majority, but they should wait for the mandates to end and choose a successor then and not before. That is how Hungary's system worked for decades and it was pretty stable. Sure, the will of the majority changed, no-one questioned the legitimacy of Magyar's victory or position, but even a large majority does not grant him the right to violate the constitutional standards of the country that is second in history to have a constitution (the Golden Bull from 1222, 7 years after Magna Carta).

Therefore this procedure was authoritarian, disrespected all norms. Hopefully the TISZA government will have better procedures and decisions in the future.
e-mars e-mars 7/20/2026 10:12
@lajosarpad I didn't mean that Hungary was in the stone age. The UK for instance doesn't have a 'written' constitution, it's just a confusing and contradicting mix of medieval and modern laws. Thanks for the clarification.
I am still kind of convinced this is a more of a marketing move than anything else but keep an open mind.
Frits Fritschy Frits Fritschy 7/20/2026 09:57
That being said, it seems a bit strange to me to nominate someone without first seeking that person's approval. And that may well have been Polgar's real reason to refuse. I wouldn't trust an offer put this way myself, and I'm a far worse chess player...
Frits Fritschy Frits Fritschy 7/20/2026 09:50
'The Head of State's mandate shall also be terminated if the conditions required for his or her election no longer exist'
'Parliament shall decide with a two-thirds majority of the votes of members present to establish ... the absence of the requirements for his or her election' [Hungarian fundamental law]
Sulyok was elected and would have been sent down (if he hadn't chosen to accept the inevitable) according to law. Seems to me, nothing dictatorial about either of it.
lajosarpad lajosarpad 7/20/2026 08:29
All Hungarians love and respect Judit Polgár, but she refused the nomination, stating that she does not feel the power in herself to unify a polarized society.

@e-mars Hungary has a constitution and has laws, we're not in the stone age :) . Yet, according to the Hungarian system, we have a government led by the Prime Minister (Péter Magyar in this case) and the parliament elects the President. Since at the latest elections Péter Magyar gained a two-third majority with his TISZA party, they can even alone elect the President, according to the rules, independently of whether the opposition agrees or not.

@Mamack1 I think every human being has dignity and deserves respect, especially the first citizen of a country. Orbán was not a dictator at all. As we can see, at the latest elections the majority of Hungarians no longer wanted him to govern, therefore he lost the elections and stepped down without issues. A dictator grabs power and does unheard stuff, like forcing a president to step down. As of Tamás Sulyok being a "pawn", that is a political opinion, which unfortunately was exacerbated without proof by the new government.

Polgár would have been able to solve the issues, but likely she did not want to be the next president put in place after the incumbent was removed via an authoritarian procedure.
Mamack1 Mamack1 7/20/2026 06:45
Sometimes "political hacks" are justified.

Sulyok was a pawn of quasi-dictator Orban and thus deserves zero respect.
e-mars e-mars 7/20/2026 06:32
Ad interim, so I also suppose this means temporarily. As good as it may sound, however Judit Polgar as far as I know was not democratically elected. I do not know the full legal implications and have zero knowledge about Hungarian constitution - if they have one - so I refrain from jumping to conclusions.
arzi arzi 7/20/2026 01:02
I, too, would be very proud of Judit Polgár if she were to become the future president of our country, Finland. Unfortunately, however, that is not possible. Nevertheless, I understand Péter Magyar’s point: he wants someone as Hungary’s president whom all Hungarians can love and respect.
lajosarpad lajosarpad 7/20/2026 12:06
Polgár is obviously a well-respected and famous person and, as a Hungarian I would be honored if she would serve as my president. However, she has to decide whether she wants to do that and if so, she would face difficulties as president, as she is not trained in legal affairs, yet, the position would require her to review and occasionally reject laws, also, she would have to overcome the constitutional crisis Péter Magyar created by pushing out the incumbent Tamás Sulyok from position three years before his mandate would have ended, without him ever giving a legal reason for that, his removal being a political hack. If Polgár decides to become president, I hope she manages to overcome these difficulties and will be a successful president.
arzi arzi 7/20/2026 12:02
Peter Magyar: "Personally, I would consider it a great honor if she accepted the nomination."

I fully agree. It would be an honor for Hungary as well.
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