Romanian police have arrested Calin Georgescu, the top candidate in last year’s annulled presidential election. Dozens of raids have been carried out across the country against his supporters and people linked to his election campaigns.
Georgescu, who is a strong critic of NATO and the EU and opposes sending military aid to Ukraine, made headlines last November when he unexpectedly won 23% of the vote in the first round of Romania’s presidential election.
However, the Constitutional Court annulled the result shortly before the second round, citing intelligence documents that alleged “irregularities” in his campaign.
Georgescu’s communications team said on Facebook that the politician was arrested just as he was about to file his new presidential candidacy:
“The system stopped him in traffic and he was pulled over for questioning at the Prosecutor General’s Office! Where is democracy, where are the partners who must defend democracy?”
Călin Georgescu în cârje adus la Parchetul General.
România stat polițienesc. pic.twitter.com/784Szlcm7L
— Dacian Romulus (@dacianromulus) February 26, 2025
Before his arrest, Georgescu himself condemned the raids on his supporters in another Facebook post:
“The communist-Bolshevik system continues its odious abuses“, he wrote, accusing the Romanian authorities of trying to “invent evidence to justify the theft of the elections and to do anything to block my new candidacy for the presidency”.
“Anti-constitutional acts”
The Romanian prosecutor’s office claims to be investigating Georgescu for “founding or supporting fascist, racist, xenophobic, or anti-Semitic organizations, as well as publicly promoting war criminals and extremist ideologies”.
The politician was released later that day but was banned by the court from leaving the country, posting on social media and appearing on TV, according to Romanian media. He faces a total of six charges, including “anti-constitutional acts” and economic crime, the authorities said in a statement.
It is also claimed that “weapons, live ammunition, and more than a million dollars hidden in a safe” were found during the raids.
“Political policing”
Following reports of Georgescu’s arrest, the politician’s supporters gathered outside the Attorney General’s office and chanted his name. The chairman of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) party, George Simion, also announced that they had entered the Prosecutor General’s office to demand an explanation.
– Until we see undeniable evidence, we suspect that this is political policing, he told local media, adding that so far “not a single piece of evidence” has been presented.
Georgescu’s surprise election victory last year and subsequent annulment over unproven allegations of Russian interference in the electoral process sparked widespread protests in the country.
They just arrested the person who won the most votes in the Romanian presidential election. This is messed up. https://t.co/hXjR4hrBcu
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 26, 2025
Both conservative and liberal parties have accused the established parties – the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the center-right National Liberal Party (PNL) – of trying to retain power by controlling the actions of the Constitutional Court. US Vice President JD Vance and Trump advisor Elon Musk have also criticized the handling of the election.
Throughout his campaign, Georgescu repeatedly insisted on Romania’s geopolitical non-alignment and stressed the importance of national sovereignty and self-sufficiency – while expressing skepticism about the strong influence of the US-led Western bloc on Romanian politics.
