Disinformation Trends Intensify: EU Corruption Claims and Student Protests Draw Ire

Disinformation actors have ramped up efforts in Slovakia over the past two weeks, targeting European institutions, opposition politicians, and even students who criticize the government, according to the latest findings from Adapt Institute.

Multiple narratives have emerged following the investigation into former European Commissioner Didier Reynders, who faces allegations of money laundering approximately €700,000 through lottery tickets between 2008 and 2018. After being questioned in October, a judge designated him as an official suspect.

SMER-SSD party members seized on this development to launch broader attacks against the European Commission. MEP Monika Beňová accused Reynders of “bullying Slovakia with fabricated reservations about the rule of law,” while her colleague Ľuboš Blaha attempted to connect Reynders to the opposition party Progressive Slovakia through their shared membership in the Renew Europe parliamentary group.

“The entire faction should be dissolved or renamed from ‘Renew Europe’ to ‘Rob Europe,'” Blaha claimed, despite the fact that the European Parliament now exists with a new composition and Reynders’ alleged activities had no connection to the faction’s work.

The narrative expanded further when Parliament Vice-President Tibor Gašpar suggested that critics of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen or Reynders face silencing, citing the case of Belgian lobbyist Frédéric Baldan. Disinfluencer Ľuboš Hrica took this claim even further, describing European institutions as “fascist larvae in the Brussels den” engaged in a conspiracy to control people through digital currency.

This rhetoric fits into a broader narrative about Western decay, exemplified by MEP Milan Mazurek’s xenophobic claims that “Western countries are turning into a jungle full of murder, rape, and terrorism” due to immigration.

Meanwhile, a chalk message critical of Prime Minister Robert Fico outside a secondary school in Poprad sparked another disinformation wave. The incident, which led to the cancellation of Fico’s planned discussion with students, resulted in police questioning a 19-year-old student who had written messages including “Fico is a traitor.”

The disinformation ecosystem quickly equated the chalk writings with “spreading hatred” toward the prime minister, with some even comparing the student to Juraj Cintula, who attempted to assassinate Fico last year. Ľuboš Blaha’s posts generated the highest engagement, mockingly referring to the student as “clean-shaven” while accusing him of identity issues and drug use without evidence.

Juraj Gedra, head of the Government Office, described the student as “a young version of the mentally ill Cintula,” while claiming progressive media were making him a “hero of primitive hatred.” The narrative attempts to delegitimize growing criticism of the government by framing it as dangerous hatred rather than valid democratic expression.

Russian propaganda narratives continued to circulate, with Ľuboš Blaha describing the freezing of Russian assets as “the biggest bank robbery in history” during an interview with TV Markíza. He blamed Ukrainian President Zelensky rather than Vladimir Putin for Ukraine being “in ruins.”

Other actors, such as nationalist party DOMOV chairman Pavol Slota, shared praise for Putin, claiming the Russian president is “hated by the West” for “expelling Soros from Russia” and banning “rainbow ideology in schools.” Meanwhile, disinformation actor Marek Šoun amplified Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov’s rhetoric about Moscow “defending its people” and fighting “Ukrainian neo-Nazis” – narratives the Kremlin uses to justify its aggression.

The Adapt Institute, supported by the Prague office of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom, continues to monitor these developments through daily tracking of disinformation, hoaxes, and conspiracy theories in Slovakia’s online information space, providing bi-weekly reports on emerging trends in malicious content.