Poland’s nationalist PiS fields historian for likely presidential face-off

Historian Karol Nawrocki will take on liberal Warsaw Mayor Rafał Trzaskowski in next year’s Polish presidential election, the opposition Law and Justice (PiS) party said Sunday.

Polls strongly suggest the election will be decided in a run-off vote between the candidates of the two biggest Polish parties: Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s Civic Coalition, which has fielded Trzaskowski, and PiS with Nawrocki.

The election will be a make-or-break moment for Tusk’s government, whose agenda has been effectively obstructed by President Andrzej Duda, with the administration lacking the vote power to override the president’s veto on key legislation. Nawrocki is expected to continue in Duda’s vein if he wins the presidency next year.

“I am ready to represent everyone in Poland,” Nawrocki told a PiS convention in Kraków, Poland’s second-largest city and its longtime historic capital, referencing his working class background.

“I’ve led a normal and humble life,” Nawrocki added in a swipe at Trzaskowski, whom PiS has long painted as elitist.

“Millions believed Poland could get better, but they were wronged,” Nawrocki said of the 2023 election that elevated Tusk to power. “As president, I will table new legislation to address [issues like] energy security or economic freedom.”

In a lengthy speech, Nawrocki also criticized the EU’s Green Deal as an obstacle to growth. “No to climate madness at the expense of Polish households,” he said.

Nawrocki, 41, does not belong to a political party. As a historian he has focused on Poland’s more recent history, and from 2009 to 2017 headed the Institute of National Remembrance, a state body scrutinizing Poland’s World War II experience and its pre-1989 communist era.

Nawrocki went on to become director of Poland’s World War II Museum in Gdańsk, where — critics say — he skewed the museum’s narrative toward nationalism after it had won international praise for its portrayal of events and the plight of civilians.

Even though the campaign doesn’t officially kick off until Jan. 8, the nominations of Trzaskowski and Nawrocki have already set things in motion.

Trzaskowski is expected to present his campaign program early next month. The first round of the election will take place at an unspecified date in May, while the likely run-off vote will be in May or June.

Current polling suggests Nawrocki will easily make it to the run-off against Trzaskowski, who is projected to beat the PiS candidate by a comfortable margin in the second round.