Poland’s Tusk says he won’t back down in top court standoff

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk attends a meeting with Vietnam's prime minister at the Government Office in Hanoi on Oct. 26. | AFP-JIJI

Bloomberg

Nov 2, 2026

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk vowed to press on with changes at the top court and accused the opposition of stirring up violence in an attempt to destroy the rule of law as the political crisis continued to spiral.

Tusk said in a TV address on Saturday that the Constitutional Tribunal in its current format isn’t independent and his government’s attempts to fix it have been sabotaged by the Law & Justice party and President Karol Nawrocki.

He spoke hours after riot police were deployed in front of the court, and two of its top judges were suspended. Nawrocki turned back his plane en route to Senegal and returned to Warsaw to hold consultations with parliamentary parties on Saturday, which Tusk’s ruling Civic Coalition didn’t attend.

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