In Poland, the suspension of the President of the Constitutional Tribunal, Bogdan Święczkowski, and his deputy has triggered a serious institutional crisis. On Friday, police sealed off the court building in Warsaw after demonstrators attempted to enter the premises. President Karol Nawrocki subsequently interrupted his official trip to Senegal and returned to his country.
The trigger was the decision of the longest-serving judge on the Constitutional Tribunal, Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, who had been appointed by current Prime Minister Donald Tusk. She assumed the temporary leadership of the court and removed Święczkowski and his deputy from their duties for one month. Both had been appointed in 2024 and 2025 respectively by the previous government. However, the Constitutional Tribunal itself states that the two remain in office. The two judicial factions mutually deny each other's legitimacy.
According to the Warsaw police, three people who had jumped over the fence and entered the premises were arrested. The officers neither entered the building nor took action against the internal guard, the capital's police command announced. The deployment had been carried out at the request of the Prosecutor General and a judge of the court, as attacks on staff and disturbances of public order had been expected imminently.
Nawrocki wrote on the platform X that the president must be in Poland at such a moment. According to reports from the news agency Ansa and other media, he arrived at the court shortly before one in the morning and managed to pass the police cordon. A published video shows him arguing with security forces and other judges over access to the building. Around four in the morning, the president was reportedly still inside the building. Hundreds of demonstrators had previously gathered in front of the court, including opposition members of parliament who wanted to express their support for the suspended judges.
The crisis has its roots in the controversial judicial reform pushed through by the Law and Justice party (PiS) between 2015 and 2023. In addition, the court refuses to recognize new judges elected by parliament in March 2026. Prime Minister Tusk explicitly supports the judge's actions. On Friday he stated that after "years of unlawfulness" under the previous PiS government there was "no other way." The process was painful, but required "decisive action." In the head of government's view, the real cause of the court's paralysis lies in the blockade by Święczkowski, who had prevented the general assembly and the admission of new judges.