Eight judges resume Poland tribunal’s work as president attacks PM Tusk on live television

Poland’s crisis over its Constitutional Tribunal deepened on Tuesday. Eight judges elected by the current ruling majority convened the court and declared they had sufficient numbers to resume its long-stalled work, while nationalist President Karol Nawrocki launched a bitter attack on Prime Minister Donald Tusk.

The eight judges held a general assembly under Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, the judge who assumed control of the court on Friday and suspended Tribunal President Bogdan Święczkowski and his deputy Bartłomiej Sochański. A third PiS-era appointee, Jarosław Wyrembak, was treated as occupying an improperly filled seat.

On that calculation, only 12 of the court’s 15 judges were eligible to participate, reducing the required two-thirds quorum from 10 to eight. The judges voted to recognise themselves as a quorum, unanimously approved the tribunal’s draft budget for 2027 and drew names for disciplinary panels to consider proceedings against Święczkowski and Sochański — though Święczkowski and his political allies rejected both his suspension and the quorum calculation.

Nawrocki used the televised opening of a National Security Council meeting, attended by Tusk and other political leaders, to attack the prime minister. Tusk was not given a chance to respond while the cameras were on.

“Full responsibility for every police officer outside the tribunal, for all the illegal actions, including suspending judges and issuing unlawful orders, lies with one man who is present in this room — Prime Minister Donald Tusk,” Nawrocki said. “I expect [the prime minister] to rein in his government’s ambitions and put an end to the illegal actions of his representatives inside the Constitutional Tribunal,” he added.

Earlier, before a Cabinet meeting, Tusk accused Nawrocki of escalating the conflict and called on him to stop attacking lawfully elected tribunal judges and allow them to work. “The president has a chance, and I hope he takes it,” Tusk said.

Tusk also accused Moscow of exploiting Poland’s political turmoil and urged politicians not to become “useful idiots” as the squabble over the court’s fate intensifies.

As the National Security Council meeting ended, Tusk reiterated his main points on the tribunal but adopted a more conciliatory tone, offering Nawrocki a one-on-one meeting to “think about how to reduce tension”. He also said he was pleased the “situation was stabilising”, alluding to the tribunal having resumed work.

The president keeps refusing to swear in five of the eight judges. Instead, they took their oaths in parliament, in a ceremony Nawrocki contends was null and void. Nawrocki and the right-wing camp also do not recognise Korwin-Piotrowska’s authority.

The judicial dispute dates back more than a decade and centres on the political appointment of judges at the top court by the previous administration of the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party, which was in power until 2023. Tusk’s government and the European Commission have insisted the court must be overhauled to conform with EU norms on impartiality.

“Appointing the new judges lies within the power of the Sejm,” European Commissioner Michael McGrath told Politico.

The feud is hardening Poland’s political divisions ahead of the 2027 parliamentary election, bringing a previously divided array of factions on the nationalist right into closer alignment against Tusk.