Pro-Putin TikTok Star Wins in Romania

“The pro-Putin, far-right politician who surprisingly won the first round of Romania’s presidential elections on Sunday had recently gone viral on social media without pollsters registering his surge,” the Financial Times reports.

“Călin Georgescu, 62, a former honorary member of the ultranationalist AUR party, had run as an independent and was credited with single-digit support for most of the campaign. But his campaign clips on TikTok depicting him as a horseback riding, martial arts fighting anti-establishment figure started trending in recent days.”