Having been lauded by liberal commentators as the saviour of Europe, Poland has now returned to its previous role as the continent’s reprobate. Presidential elections on 18 May pitched the centrist Rafał Trzaskowski of the governing Civic Coalition (KO) against the conservative-nationalist Karol Nawrocki, backed by the Law and Justice party (PiS). The choice, according to the Economist, was ‘between staying the course or handing the country back to the populists’, since a victory for the PiS would put the party on track to triumph in the next parliamentary elections in 2027. Trzaskowski had won narrowly in the first round and the pair were polling evenly in the run up to the second. The initial exit polls were too close to call. But when the final votes were counted, Nawrocki had beaten his rival by 51% to 49%, to the dismay of the mainstream press and the EU establishment.  

The outcome belies the standard presentation of Donald Tusk’s KO-led government, elected in 2023 after eight years of PiS rule, as a shining example of how to defeat the rising tide of right-wing ‘populism’. It came to power on a platform of loosening abortion restrictions, introducing same-sex partnerships, restoring the rule of law and reverting to neoliberal orthodoxy. Under Tusk’s leadership, we were told, Poland outperformed the other major economies of western Europe, with the help of EU funds that were withheld from the previous administration. It was lionized as a fearless opponent of Russian aggression: a country which, because of its geographical location and tragic history, was uniquely capable of understanding the gravity of the Ukraine conflict, and therefore willing to offer major military and financial aid to Kyiv – as well as hiking defence spending and taking in large numbers of refugees who fled the conflict. The KO’s political outlook was perfectly embodied by Trzaskowski, the current mayor of Warsaw, formerly an academic specializing in EU institutions: a personification of urbane, educated Poland.  

Yet the mythology surrounding Tusk’s government never aligned with the reality. Partly because of the threat of a presidential veto, and partly because of internal divisions within the coalition, it failed to deliver on most of its election promises, especially when it came to social and cultural issues. There has been little progress on women’s and LGBT rights. Despite the propaganda about its economic record, many Poles have had to work even harder to maintain their basic living standards, with 40% of people forced to restrict their spending to make ends meet. With Tusk introducing a new round of deregulation, public services – the health service in particular – have continued to deteriorate, leaving many with inadequate care.  

At the same time, the KO did much to extend the right-wing policies of the PiS. It has intensified the anti-migrant atmosphere which has long been building in the country, cancelling the right to asylum for some refugees crossing into Poland from Belarus and attempting to push them back across the border. Rather than taking meaningful steps to reverse the PiS legal reforms – designed to consolidate power in the executive – it has pursued a similar course of action to its predecessor: seizing control of the Polish public broadcaster by firing its directors and replacing them with sympathetic ones. Trzaskowski sought to outflank the PiS on migration during the presidential campaign, promising to strip Ukrainian refugees of benefits while pledging more deportations.  

One beneficiary of Poland’s reactionary turn was Sławomir Mentzen, the candidate of the far-right Confederation party, who gained 15% in the first round, running on a programme that included an outright abortion ban and state support for cryptocurrencies, as well as hard border controls. During the runoffs, Trzaskowski and Nawrocki each appeared on Mentzen’s YouTube channel and vied for his endorsement. Mentzen made the latter conditional upon a commitment to keep Polish troops out of Ukraine and to veto any attempt by Ukraine to join NATO. Nawrocki signed up to both demands while Trzaskowski agreed only to the first (in the end, Mentzen endorsed neither, although said he saw no reason to vote for Trzaskowski). Given the increasing unpopularity of Tusk’s escalatory approach, both candidates had a clear interest in allaying fears that Poland would be dragged further into the war. Yet both also pledged to maintain or even raise the country’s military spending, which is already nearing 5% of GDP, prioritizing weapons over welfare. 

Trzaskowski’s smooth-talking media persona made for a stark contrast with Nawrocki, whose campaign was dogged by allegations that he had been associated with far-right groups and criminal gangs, that he had participated in organized football-hooligan fights, that he had used his former role as a hotel security guard to arrange prostitutes for guests, and that he had swindled a pensioner to gain possession of his apartment. The effect of these stories on public opinion was negligible. Indeed, Nawrocki tried to use them to his advantage, dispensing with the PiS’s usual peons to conservatism and Catholicism, and styling himself as a rogue outsider.  

With a fearful mood taking hold of Poland, Nawrocki managed to convince much of the electorate that he would put ‘ordinary’ people first. Gone were previous PiS talking-points like child benefits and an increased minimum wage. Instead, his main pledge was that native Poles would be prioritized over migrants in accessing health and education. Nawrocki’s candidacy was rubber-stamped by the Trump administration just days before the final ballot. At a meeting of the Conservative Political Action Conference, held in Poland in late May, the US Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem told the audience that ‘We need you to elect the right leader’, and that Nawrocki would work with Trump to ‘fight off enemies that do not share your values’. 

The voters who cast their ballots for Nawrocki were not dissimilar to the MAGA constituency – generally poorer, more rural, less educated, and male: a grouping large enough to hand him the keys to the presidential palace. The day after the elections, Tusk announced that he would call a vote of confidence in his government, which he will almost certainly win. His weakened administration will stumble onwards until 2027, but the new president’s veto power will prevent it from implementing serious reforms. In the ensuing stalemate, divisions within the KO – which includes the social-democratic Left – will likely deepen. That means the door is now ajar for PiS, which could plausibly form a government with the Confederation Party while Nawrocki is only halfway through his term. As Europe moves right, Poland may come to seem like less of a deviation from the political mainstream than a reflection of it. 

Read on: Gavin Rae, ‘In the Polish Mirror’, NLR 124.