Far-right party AUR backs Anca Alexandrescu for Bucharest general mayor

The Alliance for the Union of Romanians, or AUR, announced during a meeting on Monday, November 3, that it supports former TV presenter Anca Alexandrescu for the position of mayor of Bucharest. The elections will be held on December 7.

The leadership of AUR decided unanimously to support Anca Alexandrescu, although she is not a party member. Defending the decision, party leader George Simion noted that she is the “best-rated candidate from the sovereignist camp.”

“Although we have capable people within AUR who would have successfully fulfilled the task of running as candidates, we preferred to give up having an AUR member in favor of the best-ranked from our sovereigntist, conservative area. It’s something we also did in December, in the second round of voting, which was annulled,” announced Simion, referring to former pro-Russian presidential candidate Calin Georgescu, set to stand trial for attempted coup.

He added that all three candidates announced so far for City Hall, Daniel Băluță (Social Democratic Party), Ciprian Ciucu (National Liberal Party), and Cătălin Drulă (Save Romania Union), are facets of the current government, which is guilty of cancelling the December 2024 presidential elections.

“The current government, which captured power in Romania and annulled the elections, has put forward three candidates. They are all different facets of the system. If we came to segment the vote on the sovereigntist area, we would clearly be traitors,” Simion argued in the meeting.

In turn, Anca Alexandrescu said that her candidacy creates “turmoil in the ruling parties.” In her speech, she claimed the mantle of anti-system fighter, saying that “this is our only chance to do what Mr. Georgescu wants, to defeat the system.”

Alexandrescu promoted Georgescu during the presidential elections of last year. However, the former candidate called for a boycott of the Bucharest elections in a video on Sunday, November 2. He argued that the current ruling coalition lacks the legitimacy to organize new elections to replace Nicusor Dan, who left the Bucharest City Hall to become president.

Despite the obvious call to boycott the elections, the TV presenter-turned-candidate decided to reinterpret Georgescu’s message, saying it “must be read not as a momentary reaction, as everyone hastily did, but as an X-ray of a long chain of abuses that has its origin in the annulment of the December 6 elections."