Janez Janša
Ivan Janša (Slovene: [ˈíːʋan ˈjàːnʃa]; born 17 September 1958), baptized and best known as Janez Janša (Slovene: [ˈjàːnɛs]), is a Slovenian politician who served three times as a prime minister of Slovenia, a position he had held from 2004 to 2008, from 2012 to 2013, and from 2020 to 2022. Since 1993, Janša has led the Slovenian Democratic Party, which has emerged as the pre-eminent Slovenian conservative party. Janša lost his fourth bid for prime minister in April 2022, his party defeated by the Freedom Movement party.
Janez Janša | |||||||||||||
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Janša in 2022 | |||||||||||||
| Prime Minister of Slovenia | |||||||||||||
| In office 3 March 2020 – 1 June 2022 | |||||||||||||
| President | Borut Pahor | ||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Marjan Šarec | ||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Robert Golob | ||||||||||||
| In office 10 February 2012 – 20 March 2013 | |||||||||||||
| President | Danilo Türk Borut Pahor | ||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Borut Pahor | ||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Alenka Bratušek | ||||||||||||
| In office 3 December 2004 – 21 November 2008 | |||||||||||||
| President | Janez Drnovšek Danilo Türk | ||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Anton Rop | ||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Borut Pahor | ||||||||||||
| Minister of Defence | |||||||||||||
| In office 7 June 2000 – 30 November 2000 | |||||||||||||
| Prime Minister | Andrej Bajuk | ||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Franci Demšar | ||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Anton Grizold | ||||||||||||
| In office 16 May 1990 – 29 March 1994 | |||||||||||||
| Prime Minister | Lojze Peterle Janez Drnovšek | ||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Office established | ||||||||||||
| Succeeded by | Jelko Kacin | ||||||||||||
| Leader of the Slovenian Democratic Party | |||||||||||||
| Assumed office May 1993 | |||||||||||||
| Preceded by | Jože Pučnik | ||||||||||||
| Member of the National Assembly for Grosuplje | |||||||||||||
| Assumed office 8 April 1990 | |||||||||||||
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| Personal details | |||||||||||||
| Born | Ivan Janša 17 September 1958 Grosuplje, PR Slovenia, FPR Yugoslavia | ||||||||||||
| Political party | League of Communists (1975-1983) Slovenian Democratic Union (1989–1991) Slovenian Democratic Party (1992–present) | ||||||||||||
| Spouse(s) | Silva Predalič Urška Bačovnik (m. 2009) | ||||||||||||
| Children | 4 | ||||||||||||
| Education | University of Ljubljana | ||||||||||||
Janša served as Minister of Defence from 1990 to 1994, a post he had also held during the Slovenian War of Independence. Janša served as prime minister from 2004 to 2008, and again became prime minister in 2012, following an early election in December 2011. On 27 February 2013, Janša's second government was ousted in a vote of non-confidence. In June 2013, Janša was sentenced to two years in prison on corruption charges. The ruling was confirmed by Slovenia's higher court in April 2014, but after the Constitutional Court of Slovenia ordered a retrial for procedural reasons, the case later expired. Despite his party winning a plurality of votes in the 2018 Slovenian parliamentary election, Janša was initially passed over as a prime minister candidate as most parties refused to join a Janša-led government because of Janša's extremist views. After spending years in opposition, Janša was selected as prime minister-designate in March 2020 following the resignation of prime minister Marjan Šarec. His third term as a prime minister ended on 13 May 2022.
A communist in his youth, Janša's political stance has drifted rightward during the course of his political career, from a liberal, pro-democracy dissident under communist rule, to a social democrat politician, and to a right-wing hardliner. Janša was described as a far-right leader by The Independent and by Foreign Policy in 2020. His style of politics has been compared to Donald Trump. He has been dubbed a "MAGA-style populist" by NPR, "the Slovenian Trump" by Der Spiegel, and "mini-Trump" by Deutsche Welle. Following the 2020 United States presidential election, Janša declared Trump the winner, and proceeded to tweet a series of conspiracy theories about the election. Janša is a close ally of Hungary's prime minister Viktor Orbán.