# Aleksandar Vučić Serbia's dominant political figure since 2012 — prime minister and then president — who has built a system of competitive authoritarianism: control over most media, a captured state apparatus, and an SNS party machine that has hollowed out the institutions around it. A former ultranationalist information minister under Slobodan Milošević, he later rebranded as a pro-EU pragmatist while maintaining close ties to Moscow and Beijing. His rule faces its gravest challenge in the student-led mass protest movement ignited by the **November 1, 2024 Novi Sad railway-station canopy collapse** that killed 16 people — a disaster blamed on corruption. Sustained nationwide demonstrations through 2026 demand snap elections; a prospective "student list" has polled competitively against the SNS. His Trump-world courtship — the collapsed Trump Tower Belgrade concession to [[Jared Kushner]]'s [[Affinity Partners]] on the NATO-bombed General Staff site, [[Donald Trump Jr.]]'s friendly podcast visits framing the protests as a color revolution, and $3.2M in Trump-linked lobbying — is documented in [[Serbia]]. ## Related - [[International Democratic Opposition Hub]] - [[Serbia]] - [[Affinity Partners]]