Why Poland’s Liberals Lost

Political blunders, distrust of elites, and Donald Tusk’s inability to deliver on his promises helped make an unknown, far-right former bodyguard the country’s next president. Worse, it will be far harder now to safeguard Polish democracy.

By Jarosław Kuisz and Karolina Wigura

June 2025

One of the best American political films of the 20th century was the 1979 satire Being There, about a simple gardener, played by Peter Sellers, who stumbles into becoming a candidate for the U.S. presidency. There has long been a debate about how much the film’s screenwriter, Jerzy Kosinski, borrowed from a best-selling 1932 Polish novel, one that everyone in Poland knows, The Career of Nicodemus Dyzma. Both the movie and the book seem prophetic of our times, and of 2025 in particular, in the United States and in Poland.

Similar to the movie, the book tells the story of a man without qualities, education, or talent, who rises from complete obscurity to become a candidate for prime minister in a matter of months. The reader follows the fast-paced plot with fascination, gradually realizing, with growing unease, that the ruthless opportunist’s ascent is possible only because the people around him are even worse.

There must be something enduringly universal about the story. After all, it has been adapted for the screen in contemporary Poland several times. And now, the trajectory of Poland’s president-elect — the right-wing, Law and Justice–aligned historian Karol Nawrocki, who a week ago defeated Warsaw’s liberal mayor, Rafał Trzaskowski, in the second round of the presidential election — strangely echoes that fictional arc.

Just a few months ago, Nawrocki’s name was unknown to many voters. After all, he had never run for office. He does, however, have a colorful biography that stretches from directing the important Institute of National Remembrance to taking part in hooligan brawls, working as a bodyguard, tattooing portraits of boxing stars on his chest, and, according to serious journalistic investigations, allegedly arranging prostitutes for hotel guests.

How did such a figure — someone who, to many, would seem ill-suited to the presidency — defeat a popular, experienced, and well-educated politician with a spotless public record? And what does this outcome mean for Poland’s future?

Liberals Failed at Home

The June 1 vote had the character of a government plebiscite. Like many elections in Poland, this one was less about selecting a vision for the future than about issuing a verdict on the present — specifically, the eighteen-month tenure of Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government, inaugurated in December 2023. That government has produced mixed reviews, to say the least. Although the argument of Larry Bartels’s famous book — that “democracy erodes from the top” — may be criticized as monocausal, in the case of Poland for more than decade it seems very apt.

This might come as a surprise to observers outside the country. Since becoming prime minister in December 2023, Tusk has become a symbol of democratic restoration — the man who peacefully removed populists from power, embraced liberal reform, revived Poland’s pro-European course, and defended Ukraine’s sovereignty. And yet, domestically, Tusk suffers from what might be called “Gorbachev syndrome”: He is admired abroad, but divisive at home. Tusk remains a polarizing figure with a high disapproval rating, whose government has stirred rising frustration with its limited effectiveness.

Tusk’s coalition promised sweeping change in 2023. It pledged to hold the populist Law and Justice party accountable for violating the constitution during its eight years in power (2015–23); restore the rule of law; reclaim judicial independence, particularly over the Supreme Court and Constitutional Tribunal; return full rights to women, including access to legal abortion and in vitro fertilization; reform public media; and make doing business easier for entrepreneurs.

Eighteen months later, and the government has delivered on few of these promises. Abortion remains effectively banned, and not a single person has faced legal consequences for abuses committed during the populist era. Ruling politicians have argued that reforms related to the rule of law would have to wait for a new president since the incumbent, Andrzej Duda, would simply veto any legislative changes. But the truth is more complex: In many cases, it was the governing coalition itself that failed to reach consensus. As a result, very few bills ever made it to the president’s desk, leaving many voters unconvinced by the excuse of an anticipated veto.

A Sharp Turn to the Right

Rafał Trzaskowski, of Tusk’s Civic Platform, is not only a well-known political figure in Poland, but also one associated with center-left values. As the long-serving mayor of Warsaw, he regularly participated in Pride parades and was a vocal advocate for same-sex marriage. He has also spoken empathetically about Ukrainian refugees and spearheaded significant support for them in the capital.

It was therefore deeply disorienting for many of his supporters when, during the presidential campaign, Trzaskowski appeared to pivot rightward. He unexpectedly expressed skepticism about whether Ukrainian refugees working in Poland should receive child benefits — despite consistent data showing that Ukrainians are, by many measures, one of Poland’s most hard-working migrant group: They are quick to integrate, eager to learn the language, and find employment almost immediately upon arrival. Later, during a televised debate, Trzaskowski tucked a rainbow flag under the podium — a flag provocatively handed to him by Karol Nawrocki.

The symbolic weight of this gesture was not lost on the public. It fell to Magdalena Biejat, candidate of The Left alliance, to put the flag on her own lectern and say what many had expected from Trzaskowski himself: that one should not be ashamed of the flag, and that LGBT+ citizens are Poles, too, and equally entitled to dignity, representation, and support.

Advertising the Opponent

The first round of voting took place on May 18, and the results shook the liberal camp. Trzaskowski’s roughly 8 percent lead from February shrank to under 2 percentage points in the run up, and many voters had cast their ballots for candidates on the far right, but also the center and left. Observers expected that Trzaskowski would seize the final two weeks of the campaign to reassert his vision and draw attention to his own platform. Instead, the opposite occurred.

Liberal media outlets and Trzaskowski’s own allies focused relentlessly on Nawrocki — specifically, on a cascade of scandals unearthed by investigative journalists. The spotlight remained fixed on the far-right candidate’s past indiscretions rather than on the core stakes of the election. Democrats made the same fatal error in the 2024 U.S. presidential election, spending more time amplifying Donald Trump’s outrageous comments than on presenting their own candidate, Kamala Harris, as a compelling alternative. In the Polish case, voters’ attention similarly gravitated away from Trzaskowski.

Cultural Twists and Shocks

The list of reasons presented so far pertains only to the immediate context surrounding the presidential election. But beneath the surface, deeper currents may have been at play — notably, cultural change and anti-elite sentiment.

Poland is undergoing a significant transformation in how it views its role in the region — particularly in relation to Ukraine, its embattled neighbor. Just three years ago, at the onset of Russia’s full-scale invasion, Poles overwhelmingly identified with Ukrainians as fellow victims of Moscow’s aggression. The outpouring of solidarity was immediate and intense: shelter, food, employment — all were offered without hesitation. But the mood has since shifted. Public-opinion surveys increasingly show a fatigue with the Ukrainian minority, and a growing number of voters have thrown their support behind anti-Ukrainian parties such as the far-right Confederation. Within this shifting atmosphere, Nawrocki’s skepticism about Ukraine’s accession to the European Union and NATO finds resonance in some sectors of the society.

There is in Poland a powerful and persistent suspicion of elites, one that continues to shape the public’s attitude toward candidates such as Trzaskowski. The Polish political imagination still reveres the figure of Lech Wałęsa, the electrician from the Gdańsk Shipyard who helped bring down communism and then ascended to the presidency. Every politician, including Tusk and Law and Justice leader Jarosław Kaczyński, has had to grapple with this archetype, often attempting to obscure their own intellectual or professional pedigree.

Perhaps this is why, during the campaign, Trzaskowski — a liberal cosmopolitan fluent in five languages who holds a doctorate and hails from a family of the old intelligentsia — seemed to carry the burden of his biography instead of treating it as an asset. At times, he appeared to be apologizing for it. Meanwhile, Nawrocki, himself a PhD-holding historian from Gdańsk, cast his roots in more populist terms: “We [who come] from small towns and villages,” he said in one of the televised debates. With such a carefully calibrated message, Nawrocki’s image — however manufactured — proved more persuasive.

International Consequences of Failure

Will Nawrocki’s presidency carry significant consequences? Undoubtedly — on several levels.

The new president, like his predecessor, is closely aligned with Jarosław Kaczyński’s Law and Justice party, even if he does not hold its membership. The Polish constitution places executive power primarily in the hands of the government. Why, then, the despair? Unlike the relatively passive President Andrzej Duda, Nawrocki enters office with energy and resolve. Though constitutionally constrained, the president can veto legislation and — under specific conditions — even decline to sign the national budget, thereby triggering the dissolution of parliament and new elections. It remains to be seen whether such a scenario, which some anticipate could happen later this year, will materialize. What is clear is that the hope for swift, decisive post-populist liberal reform has just been dealt a serious blow.

With regard to Russia and Ukraine, Nawrocki is unequivocally anti-Russian. But this does not necessarily equate to pro-Ukrainian sympathies, whereas Tusk’s government has articulated a clear and consistent pro-Ukrainian foreign policy over the past eighteen months. As a result, Poland — whose security anxieties remain acute — may be heading into a prolonged period of tension over its eastern strategy, one marked by rhetorical escalation, strategic ambiguity, and increasing polarization.

Finally, the pro-European clarity of Poland’s current diplomacy is now in question. Tusk will continue cultivating ties with leaders such as the U.K.’s Keir Starmer, Germany’s Friedrich Merz, and France’s Emmanuel Macron. But Nawrocki’s ascent underscores the growing appeal of the MAGA worldview on the European continent. The viral photograph of Nawrocki and Trump in the Oval Office may not have decided the election, but it undoubtedly carried symbolic weight. And it is almost certain that the president-elect will seek more than a photo-op on his next visit. He will pursue closeness, political endorsement, and meaningful transatlantic cooperation.

And yet, one final reflection is in order. The turbulence we are now witnessing — the mounting crisis of post-1945 liberal democracy and the ascendancy of national populism — shows no signs of abating. Poland’s presidential election is but one milestone on a longer, more perilous road. What too few yet recognize is that the real contest is not about ejecting populists from power and returning to some imagined status quo. It is about reinventing democracy itself — reshaping and reinforcing it for an era of accelerating change.

The Polish presidential election may be over, but the battle continues. We should bear in mind that Nawrocki’s victory was extremely narrow: Less than 400,000 votes separated the two candidates. This is far from a sign that the populists have a lock on the Polish electorate. The Tusk government must assess where it has gone wrong, and govern in a way that wins back the people’s trust and their faith in liberal democratic rule.

Jaroslaw Kuisz is associate professor at the University of Warsaw, the editor-in-chief of Kultura Liberalna in Warsaw. Karolina Wigura is associate professor at the University of Warsaw and a member of the board at the Kultura Liberalna Foundation in Warsaw. They are both Associates in Russian and East European Studies (REES) at the Oxford University School for Global and Area Studies and senior fellows at Zentrum Liberale Moderne in Berlin. They recently coauthored the book Post-traumatische Souveränität: Ein Essay über Ostmitteleuropa.

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