Polish Politics and Elections

[President Johnson]

Would be interesting to see a map. I assume there is a major east/west divide.

[President Johnson]

Hope Trzaskowski wins in second round. It would be good for Ukraine. And Trzaskowski is excellent, in my opinion

He would be good for the European Union as well, though the PiS is still in government and will remain so at least to 2023.

[President Johnson]

My prediction:

51.4% DUDA (incumbent)
48.6% Transkinkcswsky (or whatever his name is)

This would be my prediction as well. I don't think Duda will ultimately get defeated.

[President Johnson]

PiS reaches a new low with this spot with their primitive anti-German sentiment.

https://twitter.com/WashTimesLocal/status/1701273812048695511

https://twitter.com/pisorgpl/status/1701098261199691789

[President Johnson]

This is getting ridiculous. I hope PiS loses the election, it's one of the worst governments in Europe.

https://twitter.com/dwnews/status/1706312489967726678

Polish Foreign Minister Zbigniew Rau accused Germany of seeking to interfere in his country's internal affairs after comments from Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

The German leader said Warsaw had questions to answer over allegations that Polish consulates in Africa and Asia sold fast-tracked temporary work visas for thousands of dollars each to migrants.


With migration a central campaign theme ahead of Poland's closely contested mid-October elections, Rau accused Scholz of overstepping a boundary with his clarification request.

"The competence of the German Chancellor clearly does not concern the ongoing proceedings in Poland," the foreign minister wrote on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.

[...]

[President Johnson]

What would be the most likely coalition with this exit poll? PiS might lose power even in when they come in first, though I'm not sure whether Tusk can actually put a majority together.

But it seems like polls were relatively accurate. Polling still works in Europe, unlike in the US.

[President Johnson]

The PiS being ousted would be a massive upgrade, though I still find that they have got way too many votes all things considered. However, the campaign wasn't 100% fair with their control over parts of the media. I hope a new Tusk government can undo the damage, especially rolling back the assault on the judicial branch. That would also give Poland access to currently frozen EU funds.

[President Johnson]

If Tusk indeed becomes prime minister again, kind of reminds me of Biden and Lula. A somewhat still popular retired politician jumps back into the arena to oust a far-right government with strong authoritarian tendencies and wins, pomising to roll back the damage of the last few years.

[President Johnson]

94.92% reporting (+/- compared to 82.91% in)

PiS: 36.13% (-0.65%)
KO: 30.02% (+0.66%)
TD: 14.44% (-0.04%)
Lewica: 8.44% (+0.10%)
Kon: 7.18% (-0.06%)
BS: 1.88% (+0.01%)
PJJ: 1.63% (-0.01%)
MN: 0.13% (-0.02%)
Others: 0.15% (+0.01%)

So the three opposition, pro-EU parties of the political center garnered more than 52% of the vote? That's awesome to see and should translate into a stable parliamentary majority.

[President Johnson]

I believe that this will be the final seat distribution, give or take a seat.

PiS - 194 (-41)
KO - 157 (+23)
Third Way - 65 (+35)
Left - 26 (-23)
Konfederacja - 18 (+7)
German Minority 0 (-1)

KO + TD + Left = 248

Compared to the initial exit poll
PiS -6
KO -6
TD +10
Left -4
KWN +6
The errors balance out so the number of seats the opposition coalition wins remains spot on.

You were spot on with your seat distribution calculations.

Since no one has posted it yet, percentage of votes vs. percentages of seats:

PiS -              35.38% of votes - 42.17% of seats
KO -              30.70% of votes - 34.14% of seats
Third Way -    14.40% of votes - 14.13% of seats
Left -              8.61% of votes - 5.65% of seats
Konfederacja - 7.16% of votes - 3.91% of seats

That pretty much seals the deal, I guess. Unless the parties can't agree on a coalition, Tusk will be prime minister in a couple of weeks.

I don't actually expect Duda to pull any tricks here. Not only could that backfire in snap election, he has been somewhat less radical than the PiS government. Remember he even rejected the worst parts of the "Lex Tusk" law. Still, Tusk's new government will be busy to revoke all these laws once in office.

[President Johnson]

Tusk won't overturn many PiS laws. He doesn't have the 3/5 majority to override a presidental Veto. Tusk will spend most of his time purging the PiS patronage network and trying to unfreeze the EU recovery billion.

I'm not sure since the president of Poland is more of a ceremonial head of state similar to the president of Germany. It's not a semi-presidential republic like France, let alone a presidential system as the US has.

[President Johnson]

Duda has decided to waste everyone's time by giving Morawiecki the first shot at forming government.

Of course, he's a member of PiS and wants to drag this out.

[President Johnson]

This is just insanity: Duda wants to appoint Morawieki as prime minister today and swear-in another PiS cabinet, which subsequently has to win a confidence vote in the Sejm within 14 days. Of course, they're inevitably going to lose such a floor vote as PiS only holds 194 seats, versus 248 for Tusk's coalition.

It seems like a new tradition that right-wing governments and heads of state just no longer accept election defeats. At this point it should actually be considered to remove Duda from office. He's not acting as normal head of state but just a partisan hack that tries to keep a bunch of losers in power.

https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/1729072716697735503

[President Johnson]

https://twitter.com/euronews/status/1729204807947194769

[President Johnson]

"Donald Tusk has confirmed the names of members of his government, which is likely to take office next week."

Radosław Sikorski – foreign affairs
Adam Bodnar – justice
Barbara Nowacka – education
Marzena Czarnecka – industry
Czesław Siekierski – agriculture and rural development
Andrzej Domański – finance
Dariusz Wieczorek – science and higher education
Adam Szłapka – Europe
Paulina Hennig-Kloska – climate and environment
Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz - deputy prime minister and defence
Borys Budka - state assets
Agnieszka Dziemianowicz-Bąk - family and social policy
Tomasz Siemoniak - security services
Izabela Leszczyna - health minister
Krzysztof Gawkowski - deputy prime minister and digital affairs
Katarzyna Kotula - equality minister (a new position)


https://twitter.com/notesfrompoland/status/1733098524668006889?s=20

That's just for the Civic Platform, though? Third Way and The Left will also be part of the cabinet.

[President Johnson]

Today, Donald Tusk will be appointed by Sejm.
Tomorrow at 9 AM, Tusk will deliver an accepting speech and later will be voted of confidence.
On Wednesday, Andrzej Duda will swear Tusk's government.

I read that Duda is out of the country until Wednesday, potentially to drag it out for another one or two days.

Anyway, a lot to clean up for Tusk and his cabinet. Also seems like PiS destroyed several paper records in ministries lately to avoid potential legal consequences in the future.

[President Johnson]

Donald Tusk appointed by Sejm for position of Prime Minister.
248 - 201

248? Not a single defection from the coalition parties? That's off to a good start.

[President Johnson]

It's #PiSOver

[President Johnson]

Tusk's government vote of confidence:
248 - 201
9 absent, 1 excluded and 1 vacant

Congratulations to Poland! Wishing Tusk all the best luck. I think he's the experienced leader and steady hand now needed to undo the damage of the previous eight years.

[President Johnson]

Donald Tusk is officially PM of Poland, PIS formally out of power:

https://twitter.com/POLITICOEurope/status/1734924383922028586
https://twitter.com/POLITICOEurope/status/1734916250902401317

Probably the best international election outcome of the year. There's finally a pro-EU government back in power in the Europe's number five economy. I hope the new government will quickly reverse the damage of eight years PiS rule, especially the judiciary.

This somewhat feels a bit like the European or Polish version of Joe Biden 2020 and Lula Da Silva 2022. Like these two, Tusk returned to national politics as polls gave the the best chances to oust a sitting right-wing government with authoritarian tendencies, promising to roll back the damage inflicted domestically and restore their country's relations abroad. And like Trump and Bolsonaro, dragged out the transition of power and never really offered a gracious concession.

[President Johnson]

This guy is nothing more but a partisan hack at this point, abusing his office for partisan causes.

https://twitter.com/POLITICOEurope/status/1738618247056929143

[President Johnson]

I wonder how long this relationship between Tusk's coalition and Duda, who is acting like a partisan hack, can sustain until his term expires next year without a serious government crisis. On the one hand, they also can't impeach him while a snap election might even expand Tusk's majority.

[President Johnson]

New Left will start negotiations of joint list with KO for local election.
Not surprising, most of sejmik's constituencies have only 5-6 seats so efficient threshold is about 15%.

https://twitter.com/RobertBiedron/status/1748248986576621656?s=20

In the kinda unexpected, but kinda reasonable twist of events KO decided to run in the Sejmiks elections without the New Left. Now New Left have to quickly decide what and how they are going to do, so they are kinda screwed. PO is sure that they will get everything they can without them, and sharing with them safe spots on the electoral lists.

To this end, polling right now has PiS and PO dead even, maybe with PO ahead. This of course is not cause PO has gained ground,  but PiS has lost it, mostly to Holownia's PSL/PL2050 who are seeing a bit of a surge. And Holownia, who is more popular than the parties, is at the moment well poised to run for the presidency (at least according to this poll, I haven't seen others)

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1753056567522435187?t=iZzgoan3-tN5CO-Jnt...

Even though it's a runoff system, I think the governing coalition should nominate a joint candidate. Halowina seems like a solid choice. Duda can't be out of office soon enough.