The Romanian presidential election in May 2025 was followed with great interest across Europe. In the run-off, the pro-European, non-party mayor of Bucharest Nicușor Dan prevailed against the candidate of the far-right Alliance for the Unification of Romanians party. This was a rerun of the 2024 election, which the Romanian Constitutional Court had declared invalid two days before the run-off. The reason for this was the lack of labelling of the content of the radical right-wing candidate Călin Georgescu, who was excluded from the rerun, on TikTok as election advertising, the unequal treatment of the candidates' content on the platform and concealed donations to his campaign.
The background to the election was explained by Professor Dr Melania-Gabriela Ciot (Jean Monnet Chair of Green Deal and European Negotiations, Universitatea Babes-Bolyai) at the Round Table on European Democracy ‘Romania's Presidential Elections: Russian Influence, Democratic Resilience, and a Pro-EU Winner’. The event, moderated by Julian Plottka (Institute for European Politics), was organised by the Jean Monnet Chair for European Politics at the University of Passau together with the Institute for European Politics Berlin and Europe Direct Magdeburg.
Ciot emphasised that the elections took place in a tense national and international context. Internationally, the changed geopolitical and geo-economic situation had had an impact. Domestic politics was characterised by strong dissatisfaction and a lack of trust in the traditional parties. A great desire for change explains the victory of the non-party Dan 2025 as well as - in addition to the election manipulation - the unexpectedly good performance of the far-right candidate Georgescu in the first, annulled round in 2024.
The manipulation of the first election in 2024 was at the centre of the subsequent discussion. Georgescu's dominance on TikTok can be explained in particular by the large donations. These were used to pay a network of influencers to distribute his content, meaning that the algorithm favoured Georgescu's content over that of other candidates. Ciot emphasised the importance of strengthening media expertise and tighter regulation of very large online platforms and search engines as measures to protect elections against such influence.
Author: Theresa Hasenfratz
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