Last Friday, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s centrist, pro-EU coalition government authorised the use of police to force Poland’s Constitutional Tribunal to admit five judges whose legitimacy is disputed by President Karol Nawrocki and by the opposition Law and Justice party (PiS). Among the disputed appointees was Maciej Berek, whom Tusk himself has called his “right-hand man,” and who had served as a minister in his government until August 2026. Another, Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, took control of the Tribunal over the head of its president, Bogdan Święczkowski, issuing orders that purported to suspend both him and the vice-president.
The sight of a country’s highest court surrounded by police while its composition is altered by force is nothing short of a constitutional nightmare. A day like this could very well mark the beginning of the end of a constitutional regime.