EU court adviser urges annulment of €10 billion payments to Hungary

An independent legal adviser to the Court of Justice of the European Union has told the court to strike down the European Commission’s move to release more than ten billion euros destined for Hungary. The recommendation challenges the Commission’s December 2023 judgment that Hungary had met conditions tied to strengthening judicial independence, arguing the executive branch failed to apply the relevant standards correctly. The adviser’s conclusions do not decide the case but typically shape the court’s eventual ruling, so this guidance raises the prospect that the funding authorization could be reversed months from now. If the court follows the adviser, the Commission may face a legal rebuke and the disbursement could be invalidated, creating practical and political consequences for both Brussels and Budapest. For Hungary, a reversal would mean an abrupt legal obstacle to budget planning and EU-supported projects that expected those transfers. For the Commission, an adverse ruling would expose its conditionality enforcement mechanism to scrutiny and could constrain how the executive links rule-of-law benchmarks to payments in other member states. The case underscores the growing use of judicial avenues to contest political decisions within the EU budgetary framework, lengthening timelines for final settlement and heightening uncertainty around conditional funding tools. Market or macroeconomic shocks are unlikely in the immediate term, but affected programs could see implementation delays and contractors may confront cash-flow disruptions. The opinion also signals to national governments and stakeholders that judicial independence remains a litigable criterion with tangible budgetary stakes. Legal teams and policy units in Brussels and member capitals will now prepare for protracted litigation and consider contingency measures if the court annuls the Commission’s act. Whatever the final judgment, the episode amplifies tensions between rule-of-law enforcement and political compromise inside the union. The outcome will be a test of whether judicial review can effectively recalibrate executive discretion in deploying conditional EU funds, and it will reverberate through future conditionality disputes.