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Milanovic, who is often compared to Donald Trump for his combative style of communication with political opponents, faces seven other contenders, including Dragan Primorac, the candidate of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union.

Neither is likely to get more than 50% in the first round of voting on Sunday, according to pre-election polls. If that happens, the two are expected to face off in the second round on Jan. 12.

The most popular politician in Croatia, Milanovic had served as prime minister in the past. Populist in style and left-leaning, the president has been a fierce critic of the prime minister, Andrej Plenkovic, and continuous sparring between the two has lately marked Croatia’s political scene.

Plenkovic the prime minister, has sought to portray the vote as one about Croatia’s future in the EU and NATO. He has labelled Milanovic “pro-Russian” and a threat to Croatia’s international standing.

“The difference between him and Milanovic is quite simple: Milanovic is leading us East, Primorac is leading us West,” he said.

Though the presidency is largely ceremonial in Croatia, an elected president holds political authority and acts as the supreme commander of the military.

Milanovic has criticised the NATO and European Union support for Ukraine and has often insisted that Croatia should not take sides. He has said Croatia should stay away from global disputes, thought it is a member of both NATO and the EU.

Milanovic has also blocked Croatia’s participation in a NATO-led training mission for Ukraine, declaring that “no Croatian soldier will take part in somebody else’s war.”

His main rival in the election, Primorac, has stated that “Croatia’s place is in the West, not the East.” His presidency bid, however, has been marred by a high-level corruption case that landed Croatia’s health minister in jail last month and which featured prominently in pre-election debates.

Trailing a distant third in the pre-election polls is Marija Selak Raspudic, a conservative independent candidate. She has focused her election campaign on the economic troubles of ordinary citizens, corruption and issues such as population decline in the country of some 3.8 million.

Sunday’s presidential election is Croatia’s third vote this year, following a snap parliamentary election in April and the European Parliament balloting in June.

President-elect Donald Trump appeared to side with technology bosses Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy in a row over a visa programme that brings skilled workers to the US.

Trump told the New York Post on Saturday that he “always liked” H-1B visas and hired guest workers under the scheme – even though he’s previously been critical of the programme.

He was wading into a debate that has pitted his advisors from the tech world against Republicans who want a harder line on all forms of immigration.

The argument broke out after Ramaswamy, tapped by Trump along with Musk to slash government spending, blamed American culture for US firms deciding to hire skilled workers from other countries.

“Our American culture has venerated mediocrity over excellence,” Ramaswamy wrote in a long X post that argued that foreign workers improve the US economy.

“A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian [the top student in a class], will not produce the best engineers,” he wrote.

The post attracted backlash from anti-immigrant Trump supporters, and Ramaswamy later clarified that he believed “the H-1B system is badly broken & should be replaced”.

After the argument raged online for days, Trump told the Post: “I’ve always liked the visas, I have always been in favour of the visas. That’s why we have them.”

“I have many H-1B visas on my properties. I’ve been a believer in H-1B. I have used it many times. It’s a great program,” he said.

Trump moved to restrict access to the H-1B programme during his first term.

Both the president-elect and his running mate JD Vance have been critical of the visas in the past, although Vance has close ties to the tech world and in his previous career as a venture capitalist funded start-ups that hired workers with H-1B visas.

Ramaswamy’s assertions led to a full-blown row online over the holidays, as mainstream Republicans and far-right influencers joined in criticising him and other wealthy figures in Trump’s inner circle.

“If we are going to have a throwdown, let’s have it now,” prominent Trump supporter Steve Bannon said on his War Room podcast on Friday. He went on to call the Republican claims of support of the H-1B programme a “total scam”.

Ramaswamy’s perceived view of skilled worker visas was backed by Elon Musk, the X, Tesla and SpaceX boss selected to co-direct Trump’s proposed “Department of Government Efficiency”.

Musk defended the H-1B visa programme as attracting the “top ~0.1%” of engineering talent”.

“Thinking of America as a pro sports team that has been winning for a long time and wants to keep winning is the right mental construct,” he wrote.

Critics online posted screenshots of job postings at Musk’s companies filled by people with H1-B visas, showing salaries of $200,000 and much less, and argued these hires did not constitute an elite talent pool but rather a way to hold down the wages of US-born workers.

Musk then shot back at “contemptible fools”, saying he was referring to “those in the Republican Party who are hateful, unrepentant racists”.

“They will absolutely be the downfall of the Republican Party if they are not removed,” he wrote.

He later swore at one of his critics and said he would “go to war” to defend the visa programme.

Nikki Haley, Trump’s former ambassador to the United Nations and a former Republican presidential candidate, became a prominent voice arguing against Ramaswamy and Musk.

“There is nothing wrong with American workers or American culture,” she wrote in response on X. “All you have to do is look at the border and see how many want what we have. We should be investing and prioritizing in Americans, not foreign workers.”

Haley, who like Ramaswamy was born to Indian immigrants, was joined in opposing the visa programme by far-right accounts online.

Laura Loomer, an anti-Islam activist who regularly spreads conspiracy theories but is also known for her unwavering support of Trump, led the online charge with posts viewed millions of times.

Earlier in the week, Loomer criticised Trump’s choice of Sriram Krishnan, an India-born entrepreneur, as the White House senior advisor on artificial intelligence. Loomer wrote that Krishnan was a “career leftist” who is “in direct opposition to Trump’s America First agenda”.

Cheered on by far-right X accounts, she also called Indian immigrants “invaders” and directed racist tropes at Krishnan.

Loomer then accused Musk, who owns X, of “censorship” for allegedly restricting replies to her posts on the network and removing her from a paid premium programme.

Echoing criticisms of Trump about the influence of the X boss, she wrote: “‘President Musk’ is starting to look real… Free speech is an illusion.”

On Friday and Saturday, a number of other conservative and far-right accounts also complained that the reach of their messages had been throttled on X.

• Laura Loomer: Who is conspiracy theorist travelling with Trump?

The number of H-1B visas issued is capped at 65,000 per year plus an additional 20,000 for people with a master’s from US institutions.

Recent research by Boundless, an immigration consultancy, indicates that around 73% of the H-1B visas are issued to Indian nationals, with 12% issued to Chinese citizens.

Trump promised that mass deportations of undocumented immigrants will start immediately after he takes office.

In recent days the president-elect also denied that he’s unduly under the influence of Musk and the other billionaires who backed his campaign.

On Sunday, Trump told a conservative conference in Arizona that he was not under Musk’s thumb.

“You know, they’re on a new kick,” he told the crowd at AmericaFest, organised by Turning Point USA. “All the different hoaxes. The new one is that President Trump has ceded the presidency to Elon Musk.”

“No, no, that’s not happening,” he said. “He’s not gonna be president.”

Companies that previously feuded with President-elect Trump are now making seven-figure donations to his 2025 inauguration.

Trump has butted heads with several Fortune 500 company executives over the years, but following his presidential election victory in November, some of those same big-business leaders are dropping major cash on the incoming president’s exclusive inaugural festivities. 

“In the first term, everyone was fighting me. This time, everyone wants to be my friend,” Trump recently said at Mar-a-Lago, according to The Washington Post.

Meta, the world’s largest social media network headed by Mark Zuckerberg, suspended Trump’s Facebook and Instagram accounts in 2021 after the events of Jan. 6 — which Trump called an “insult” to his voters. In his new book, titled “Save America,” Trump accused Zuckerberg of “plotting” against him in 2020. 

DOJ SEEKS TO BLOCK JAN. 6 DEFENDANTS FROM ATTENDING TRUMP INAUGURATION

“He told me there was nobody like Trump on Facebook. But at the same time, and for whatever reason, steered it against me,” Trump wrote. “We are watching him closely, and if he does anything illegal this time he will spend the rest of his life in prison — as will others who cheat in the 2024 Presidential Election.”

Trump, in his book, also accused Zuckerberg of “always plotting to install shameful Lock Boxes in a true PLOT AGAINST THE PRESIDENT.”

However, the relationship appeared to change course as the election drew nearer. After Trump’s Butler, Pennsylvania, assassination attempt in July, Zuckerberg said Trump’s fist pump in the air after suffering a bullet wound to the ear was “one of the most bada– things I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Shortly after Trump won the election in November, Zuckerberg met with the incoming president at Mar-a-Lago. Just weeks later, Meta donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund. 

JOHNSON ALLIES URGE TRUMP TO INTERVENE AS MESSY SPEAKER BATTLE THREATENS TO DELAY 2024 CERTIFICATION

“Mark Zuckerberg has been very clear about his desire to be a supporter of and a participant in this change that we’re seeing all around America, all around the world with this reform movement that Donald Trump is leading,” Trump adviser Stephen Miller said during an appearance on “The Ingraham Angle.”

Despite a yearlong clash between Amazon’s billionaire founder, Jeff Bezos — who also owns The Washington Post — and the incoming president, the e-commerce company recently pledged to donate $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund.

After Trump told Fox News’ Sean Hannity in 2016 that Amazon was “getting away with murder, tax-wise,” Bezos fired back at the then-presidential candidate.

Bezos, appearing at a technology conference, said that Trump’s comments were “not an appropriate way for a presidential candidate to behave.”

“Washington Post employees want to go on strike because Bezos isn’t paying them enough. I think a really long strike would be a great idea,” Trump wrote in another hit at the billionaire on X, then Twitter, in June 2018. “Employees would get more money and we would get rid of Fake News for an extended period of time! Is @WaPo a registered lobbyist?”

The mood appeared to have shifted following the 2024 election, when Bezos said he was “very optimistic” about Trump’s regulatory agenda.

“I’m very hopeful — he seems to have a lot of energy around reducing regulation,” Bezos said at the New York Times DealBook Summit. “My point of view is, if I can help him do that, I’m going to help him.”

When Ford agreed to make a deal to meet California’s efficiency standards, the company defied then-President Trump’s plans to push back on the state setting its own green energy standards for automakers. 

Trump voiced his opposition to the auto giant’s decision, saying that Henry Ford, the company’s founder, would be “very disappointed if he saw his modern-day descendants wanting to build a much more expensive car that is far less safe and doesn’t work as well, because execs don’t want to fight California regulators.”  

Ford, one of the world’s largest automakers, recently announced it will be making a seven-figure donation to Trump’s inauguration in January. 

Other major automakers, such as GM and Toyota, will also make individual donations of $1 million to Trump.

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Trump will also receive a $1 million inauguration donation from Intuit, whose stock recently dropped in November after it was reported that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was considering creating a free tax-filing app.

As NATO member states struggle to meet their defense spending goals and war rages on Europe’s eastern front, officials are struggling to agree on a plan to shore up hundreds of billions of dollars to bolster defenses. 

Eight NATO countries did not meet their 2% target for defense spending in 2024. And as many member states struggle with chronically stressed budgets, calls to meet those goals are not being heeded quickly. 

The European Commission estimates about 500 billion euros, the equivalent of $524 billion in investments, are needed in the coming decade to defend Europe against evolving threats. 

NATO LEADERS PREDICT ERA OF 2% DEFENSE SPENDING ‘PROBABLY HISTORY’ AS TRUMP REPORTEDLY FLOATS HIGHER TARGET

The EU’s budget cannot be used to fund defense directly, and some European officials and NATO experts are proposing a global defense bank to dole out funds for military modernization. 

A defense, security and resilience (DSR) bank would issue bonds backed by AAA ratings for financially strapped countries to upgrade their defenses and would provide guarantees for commercial banks to offer credit to defense suppliers. 

“This is not a substitute to raising defense spending in each of these countries. I think it should be a supplemental tool,” Giedrimas Jeglinskas, chairman of the national security committee in the Lithuanian parliament and a former NATO official, told Fox News Digital. 

His remarks echo those of incoming President Trump, who has long threatened to pull the U.S. out of NATO due to the number of nations missing the mark on the 2% goal for defense spending. 

“I think we have to look at it also as an opportunity for the U.S. as well,” Jeglinskas added. “I understand the skepticism by Donald Trump of the World Bank and then the IMF [International Monetary Fund] and IFC [International Finance Corporation] and other institutions. I think there’s been a lot of capital deployed and a lot of investments that these banks or institutions do. The real impact is, at best, questionable. So, I think we have to have very clear KPIs [key performance indicators]. We need to build defense.” 

The United States’ $824 billion defense budget in 2023 equaled half of total defense spending by all NATO member states combined at $1.47 trillion.

PUTIN SAYS RUSSIA READY TO COMPROMISE WITH TRUMP ON UKRAINE WAR

The return of Trump to the White House, coupled with a U.S. push to refocus on China, has left Europeans wondering whether the U.S. will have less of an appetite to defend Europe in years to come. 

More EU defense chiefs and foreign ministers have pitched the idea of issuing joint debt through bonds to finance military projects. 

But some countries like Germany have voiced concerns about maintaining their own sovereignty and a disproportionate financial burden on some countries. 

The DSR bank idea is explained at length in a new Atlantic Council report by defense fellow Rob Murray.

“For allies across both the Euro-Atlantic and Indo-Pacific regions, the bank could go beyond offering low-interest loans for defense modernization to facilitating equipment leasing, currency hedging, and supporting critical infrastructure and rebuilding efforts in conflict zones like Ukraine,” Murray wrote. 

“An additional critical function of the DSR bank would be to underwrite the risk for commercial banks, enabling them to extend financing to defense companies across the supply chain.”

The goal would be to offer financing to small and medium-sized defense companies that often struggle with access to funds. 

“By providing loans with extended maturities, the bank would offer predictable and sustainable funding for defence modernisation. Its governance structures would align funding with collective security goals, such as upgrading arsenals and investing in emerging technologies,” Jeglinskas wrote in a recent op-ed for the Financial Times.

Asked how the DSR bank would get countries to agree on defense funding priorities, Jeglinskas likened the idea to the U.K.-led Joint Expeditionary Force, a military alliance that includes Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden.

Jeglinskas noted the 33 trillion euros in European assets under management across the continent. 

“There’s really no political will, no risk appetite to move them anywhere besides the kind of bond markets where they rest now,” he said. “But several nations need to build that initial capital, and then, by using the sovereign rating to get to hopefully AAA in capital markets, raise that money from bond markets and to start funding defense programs.”

The European Investment Bank has doled out long-term loans and guarantees to European nations’ projects that align with EU policy goals. 

“But even they are struggling with kind of shifting their mandate towards more dual-use technologies is still not allowed in their funding package,” said Jeglinskas. 

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“Of course, every other bank in Europe is looking at EIB for their signals. That signaling hasn’t been there yet. So, that’s the point. We need to create some sort of mechanism, and that kind of global defense bank would be one of the tools that we could use to rally the capital and really direct it toward defense. So, it’s really creating another multilateral lending institution.”