Poland is now fully on track for a far-right takeover

A pimp, a football hooligan, and a mafia-world boxer who preys on the elderly to swindle them out of their homes — this is not the grotesque résumé of some back-alley freakshow brawler, but the president-elect of Poland. Karol Nawrocki, the successful conservative presidential candidate has offered the most inspiring message yet to the nation’s most degenerate strata: there are no limits to what you can become, no matter how vile your past. Did you beat a Syrian teenager half to death behind a kebab shop? The foreign ministry needs your moral clarity. Do you owe fifteen years of back child support and run a Telegram channel about “pure Polish bloodlines”? You might just be the next Minister of Family Affairs. Did you stab someone in a dark alley? Poland might just pick you to be the prime minister. The standards for presidential conduct are now officially in the gutter, as long as you are a right-wing politician.

But perhaps there is a method to this madness. Maybe Poland wants a ruthless strongman — someone to rule with an iron fist and a broken bottle. After all, who better to “get things done” than a man you can easily picture beating someone to death behind a stadium?

Karol Nawrocki, the newly anointed conservative president, reportedly took part in illegal, pre-arranged football hooligan brawls — a charming pastime known to end in shattered bones, comas, and the occasional corpse. Is this the leader Poland craves? A kind of Frank Underwood stripped of intelligence and charm, but gifted instead with steroid-swollen biceps and the moral compass of a pipe wrench? Perhaps his opponent could have clinched victory with fewer policies and more testosterone injections.

I, a lowly libertarian, might just be incapable of comprehending the infinite wisdom of the electorate.

The race remained razor-thin until the very last ballot was counted. Karol Nawrocki narrowly clinched victory in the second round with only 50.89% of votes. His chief opponent, Rafał Trzaskowski, the centre-left mayor of Warsaw, suffered a familiar fate, having also lost five years earlier to Andrzej Duda.

The main issue may not have been the campaign itself, but the dismal performance of his centre-left party in government. For the past two years, Civic Platform has ruled through a patchwork coalition—cobbled together with three other parties—and under a conservative president whose veto has ensured that virtually none of the policies imposed by the previous populist right-wing government were undone. The coalition, spanning from the progressive New Left to a conservative, agrarian PSL party, has been paralysed by internal disagreement. For that coalition, even a modest same sex union proposal was too much to agree on.

As the presidential election neared, the government’s chances for a second term in a similar configuration were dwindling, but the hope of finally having a friendly figure in the presidential palace was the last hope to finally push some reforms through and restore faith in their capability to effectively govern.

All hope is now extinguished for the coalition. Any prospect of governing beyond 2027 has evaporated, short of some laughably implausible alliance with the far right. Three of the four ruling parties may not even survive the next electoral culling. Polska 2050, the arguably most free market option (it has in its ranks a protege of the libertarian hero prof. Leszek Balcerowicz, Ryszard Petru), ran for president with a candidate who once doubled as a religious guru and a Poland’s Got Talent host. He scraped together less than five per cent.

The agrarians are on life support, gasping for political relevance. Meanwhile, the left is too busy cannibalising itself to pose any real threat: split between the vaguely progressive New Left and the de facto neo-Marxist Together party—whose idea of strategy is to appeal simultaneously to conservative socialists and ideological purists, and who, out of sheer principle, refuse to govern alongside Civic Platform. Their presidential hopefuls pulled in a total of 4.2% and 4.8%, respectively—both teetering on the edge of parliamentary oblivion.

The current government will likely limp along until the next election, if only because no one wants to give up their ministerial offices early. But there is no path left to maintain power. The only remotely beneficial outcome of this election might be the death of Civic Platform and the emergence of a new, not-yet-compromised liberal alternative.

An Era of the Far Right

On the other hand, the far right is enjoying its strongest moment yet. Sławomir Mentzen secured over 14% of the vote in the first round and, fully aware of how valuable his supporters would be in the runoff, took it upon himself to play kingmaker. He summoned both remaining candidates to his office for interviews, as if auditioning them for the presidency. Remarkably, both Nawrocki and Trzaskowski showed up. Nawrocki went a step further, eagerly signing an eight-point agreement presented by Mentzen himself:

• I will not sign any law that raises existing taxes, contributions, or fees for Poles, or introduces new fiscal burdens on Polish citizens.
• I will not sign any law that restricts cash transactions, and I will stand guard over the Polish złoty.
• I will not sign any law that limits the freedom to express views consistent with the Polish Constitution.
• I will not allow Polish soldiers to be sent to Ukrainian territory.
• I will not sign any law ratifying Ukraine’s accession to NATO.
• I will not sign any law that restricts Poles’ access to firearms.
• I will not agree to transfer any powers of the authorities of the Republic of Poland to the organs of the European Union.
• I will not sign the ratification of any new EU treaties that weaken Poland’s position.

Mentzen’s favouritism was barely disguised: Nawrocki was treated to a lighthearted, almost chummy interview, while Trzaskowski endured a barrage of attacks, including a moment in which Mentzen accused him of “grooming children with gay pornography.” The contrast was stark and telling.

Mentzen himself is a fascinating figure—I’ve even written an entire article exploring who he really is. Under the right circumstances, he might succeed in pushing through a few sensible tax reforms. Unfortunately, he is surrounded by a rather chaotic entourage.

Half of the Confederation party he leads consists of members from the Nationalist Movement, staunch socialist nationalists bent on squeezing out any remaining liberty from the Polish people. The manpower within his own supposedly conservative-liberal party isn’t much better. It includes antivaxxers, Eurosceptics, antisemites, anti-LGBT activists, and defenders of traditional values who nostalgically long for Russia. Mentzen himself also espouses much of that rhetoric.

Is Confederation insufficiently far-right for you? Polish political menu offers some even spicier options. Based on the last presidential election, the world-renowned antisemite Grzegorz Braun, who won global headlines for destroying Hanukkah candles in the parliament halls with a fire extinguisher and harming a woman in the process, has a decent shot at four more years in the parliament, as he received 6% of the votes. Braun puts on quite a spectacle for his devotees. He vandalises posters condemning anti-LGBT persecution, steals Christmas trees adorned with EU flags, and rips Ukrainian flags from city halls—symbols of solidarity with a nation enduring its third year of relentless war with Russia—only to burn them.

This presidential election has already set the framework for the next governing coalition. The conservative party, Law and Justice, lacks the numbers to rule alone and will align itself with Confederation. The only remaining uncertainty is whether Grzegorz Braun’s cult will be necessary to secure a majority. As H.L. Mencken said, “the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”