“I've always stood up for Polish interests,” Andrzej Duda told supporters in the small northern town of Polczyn-Zdroj just hours after being criticized by the U.S. for giving the greenlight to a panel that would investigate Poland's opposition leader. “Nobody is going to stop me.”
Despite the defiant rhetoric, Poland’s president rowed back just four days later. Stiff criticism, not just from the U.S. but also the European Union — with both saying the panel could be used to interfere in October’s national elections — forced Duda into an embarrassing climbdown. On June 2 he promised to de-fang the legislation dubbed Lex Tusk because it is seen as targeting former Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
This political whiplash laid bare the tensions in a country whose strategic importance has expanded massively since Russia invaded Ukraine, but whose nationalist government has been accused by allies of failing to uphold democratic standards. Poland is still engaged in a years-long fight with the European Commission over attacks on the judiciary and the need for measures to protect the independence of the media.
