Polish Politics and Elections

[MaxQue]

So, who is Tadeusz Rydzyk?

There is allegations in Canadian news the Polish government is spying on Canadian citizens (including a former deputy Premier of Alberta) from Polish origin criticizng him.

[MaxQue]

So, who is Tadeusz Rydzyk?

There is allegations in Canadian news the Polish government is spying on Canadian citizens (including a former deputy Premier of Alberta) from Polish origin criticizng him.

LOL Jesus what

Tadeusz Rydzyk probably is no longer as influential as he used to be, but basically he is National Catholic media mogul priest (think of a variant of Charles Coughlin) with his own businesses, schools, radio, TV etc. due to whose support PiS is basically unbeatable in that 5-10% of devout elderly Catholic part of society. I think there are Wikipedia articles and a lot of media coverage about Tadeusz Rydzyk and his Radio Maryja. He is basically a symbol for: a) involvement of clergy into politics b) involvement of clergy into worldly matters, like sh**tloads of money.

Our news said the subject was slightly touched in a meeting of the Sejm, when the opposition also alleged PiS fired the consul in Vancouver because he refused to take part in such activities.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/lukaszuk-poland-surveillance-1.6933104

[MaxQue]

So far nearly all counted votes are from abroad and basically all of them from the United States and Canada,  so they skew heavily towards PiS.

What´s the main reason Poles in Northern America are more conservative?? Is it because they emigrated much earlier than the Poles in Europe and therefore their only contact to their homeland is TVP Polonia??

It's also their reasoning, i.e. to escape "komunizm" on behalf of "freedom".

Through, from Canada, I see differences. Montreal, Vancouver, Ottawa and Calgary voted for PO, while Toronto 3x, Mississauga x2, Winnipeg and Edmonton voted for PiS.

[MaxQue]

Any breakdown of the vote here in the US? Image there were a lot of voters here in the Chicago area.

There is 8 voting stations in Chicago.

3 of them didn't report yet, 4 are a PiS lanslide and 1 is a PO landslide.

The 6 stations elsewhere in the state are also easy PiS wins.

[MaxQue]

The Chicago Metro Area is the main reason PiS was the winner here in the United States. In 14 polling states, the only lost 2 and they only failed to get a majority in a total of 4. In some polling places they got over 70% of the vote!

So the same constituency that votes 70% Democratic in US election votes 70% for the Polish GOP. Ideological splits.

Same in Canada, where the strongest PiS polling places are the Mississauga ones (which are swing suburbs of Toronto). At the same time, the southern Alberta (that's the most conservative place in the country) polling place voted for KO.

[MaxQue]

So Tusk is now certain to become PM again? The 3 parties aiming to oust PiS obatin 54% of seats now, which is an insurmountable advantage.

Kind of ironic that this would be the 2nd time Tusk ended the PiS reign, he already did so in 2007 when Kacysnki himself was his predecessor as PM.

There is the chance that the PiS president ends up calling for new elections after first giving PiS the mandate for government (which would fail), but I think such an election would only reinforce the opposition’s position as they could easily hammer on PiS not willing to listen to the 53-54% that disagree with them and instead calling a costly new election.

Can the President do that? I'm not fully aware of the Presidential powers in Poland, but isn't there somekind of waiting period until the President is allowed to use his power of dissolving Parliament?

From Google translate on Polish Wikipedia, it seems the President only have have that power if there is a 2/3 majority in the Sejm in favour,  a failure by the Sejm to elect a Prime Minister (but it seems they have the power to elect their own if they reject the President choice before he has the power to "shorten the term") or failure to submit a budget.

[MaxQue]

I've found a table on en.wikipedia.org (2023_Polish_parliamentary_election) which shows the results of the parties and independents within a list:

For example:

   New Left   1,199,503   5.55   19   −17
   Left Together   453,730   2.10   7   +1
   Independents and others   205,785   0.95   0   −5

The Left      Total   1,859,018   8.61   26   −23

How is this table calculated?

Can voters of "The Left" indicate if they support New Left or Left Together?

You are voting for a candidate on a list, not a list per se.