Polish voters face stark choice between EU integration and nationalist revival

Poles were voting on Sunday in a presidential election that will decide whether Warsaw follows the pro-European path set by Prime Minister Donald Tusk, or take a step towards bringing back the nationalist admirers of U.S. President Donald Trump.

Trump’s return to power has energised eurosceptics across Europe, and Sunday’s ballot will be the sternest test of Tusk’s pro-European vision since he came to power in 2023, ousting the nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party.

The election pits Warsaw Mayor Rafal Trzaskowski, from Tusk’s Civic Coalition, against conservative historian Karol Nawrocki, who is backed by PiS.

Trzaskowski has been cast as the frontrunner, likely to face Nawrocki in a run-off, due on June 1, if no candidate wins over 50%. Media blackout laws forbid the publication of opinion poll results from early on Saturday until voting ends on Sunday.

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Also competing are far-right candidate Slawomir Mentzen from the Confederation party, Parliament Speaker Szymon Holownia of the centre-right Poland 2050 and Magdalena Biejat from the Left.

The Polish first round vote takes place on the same day as a second round presidential run-off in Romania, where George Simion, a nationalist who campaigns to “Make Romania Great Again”, faces centrist Bucharest Mayor Nicusor Dan.

A victory for two eurosceptic candidates would send shockwaves through the European Union at the bloc grapples with the twin challenges of Russia’s invasion of Poland’s eastern neighbour Ukraine and Trump’s tariffs.

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Polls in Poland opened at 7 a.m. (0500 GMT) and close at 9 p.m. Around 29 million people are eligible to vote.

The Polish president has limited executive powers but can veto legislation. That has allowed outgoing President Andrzej Duda, a PiS ally, to stymie efforts by Tusk to undo judicial changes implemented under the PiS, which Tusk says hamper democracy.

Trzaskowski has pledged to cement Poland’s role as a major player at the heart of European policymaking and work with the government to roll back PiS’s judicial changes.

‘END THE CHAOS’

“I would definitely strengthen relations with our partners… within NATO and the EU,” he told state broadcaster TVP Info on Friday. “I will also ask lawmakers to give me the bills Duda vetoed to sign… I also hope that we will end the chaos in the justice system that PiS left us.”

Nawrocki’s campaign was rocked by allegations, which he denies, that he deceived an elderly man into selling him a flat in return for a promise of care he did not provide. But Trump showed support by meeting Nawrocki in the White House.

Nawrocki casts the election as a chance to stop Tusk achieving unchecked power and push back against liberal values represented by Trzaskowski, who as Warsaw mayor patronised LGBT marches and took down Christian crosses from public buildings.

“The cross that my opponent took down in Warsaw… 1,000 years of heritage of the Polish state, is our strength, is our energy,” he told a rally in the eastern city of Lublin.

Unlike some other eurosceptics in central Europe, Nawrocki supports military aid to help Ukraine fend off Russia. However, he has tapped into anti-Ukrainian sentiment among some Poles weary of an influx of refugees from their neighbour.

He has said Polish citizens should get priority in public services and criticised Kyiv’s attitude to exhumations of the remains of Poles killed by Ukrainian nationalists during World War Two.