Tusk Moves to Suspend Poland's Top Judge Amid Nightly Protests

Prime Minister Donald Tusk stated on Saturday that his government will continue its push to restore the independence of Poland's Constitutional Tribunal. This decision comes as hundreds of demonstrators gathered for a second consecutive night to oppose the suspension of the court's president, Bogdan Święczkowski.

Tusk argued that the suspension is a required step to ensure the judiciary operates without political interference. He noted that the process is difficult and sometimes painful following years of what he described as lawlessness. The pro-European coalition government maintains that the tribunal has been impaired for years due to appointments made by the previous Law and Justice party, or PiS, which governed from 2015 to 2023.

The European Union's top court had previously ruled that the tribunal was no longer impartial after PiS made its appointments. Since Tusk took power in 2023, his attempts to balance the court have faced resistance from two successive presidents aligned with PiS, including the current head of state, Karol Nawrocki. The government asserts that Święczkowski, who became head of the court under PiS, repeatedly broke the law and blocked judges elected by the parliamentary majority from taking their posts.

Tensions escalated on Friday evening when the Constitutional Tribunal's website announced the suspension of Święczkowski. Shortly after the announcement, protesters including PiS leader Jarosław Kaczyński and far-right politicians began rallying outside the building. Police reported that they detained three protesters that night after some threw objects at officers and attempted to break through the security fence.

President Nawrocki returned home from a trip to Senegal on Friday evening after turning his plane around. He then traveled to the Constitutional Tribunal that night, where he said he helped the suspended president enter the building. A top aide to the president, Marcin Przydacz, described the situation as a massive constitutional crisis resulting from an illegal attempt to take over an important institution.

The political standoff is likely to deepen polarization in Poland one year before the next parliamentary election. Nawrocki has invited all parliamentary parties to talks on Saturday to defuse tensions, though Tusk did not attend the meeting. Representatives from Poland 2050 and the Polish People's Party, which are part of Tusk's governing coalition, did meet with the president. Przydacz noted that the outcome depends on the political parties that have supported Tusk so far.

In a statement on Saturday night, Tusk compared PiS to a man who steals an elderly woman's purse and then claims to be the victim when police catch him. He said the opposition's response to the suspension represents another stage in the process of destroying the rule of law in Poland.