The nationalist opposition speaks of a coup d'état; Donald Tusk's Government, of restoring the rule of law. President Karol Nawrocki turned his plane around en route to Senegal to return to the capital.
What happened this Friday in Warsaw
The crisis erupted in the afternoon of October 30. Judge Anna Korwin-Piotrowska, one of the magistrates elected by the current Sejm (the lower house) in March 2026, signed an order that suspends for one month the functions of Święczkowski and Sochański and assumed the direction of the court, according to Rzeczpospolita and Wprost. The profiles of both disappeared from the institution's website, according to the official agency PAP.
Święczkowski's circle responded immediately: it maintains that he is still president, that the website has been illegally taken over and that whoever acts against the court commits the crime of coup d'état.
The police explained that they acted after receiving two written statements: one from the attorney general and Minister of Justice, Waldemar Żurek, which asked to monitor the court's security because of the protests, and another from Korwin-Piotrowska herself, which warned of possible risks for judges and workers. The officers assure that they have not entered the building and that they are limiting themselves to the outer perimeter. Three people were detained for jumping the fence and, according to Reuters, objects were thrown at the officers.
Why Nawrocki has returned urgently
The head of state, ally of the Law and Justice (PiS) party and declared adversary of Tusk, suspended his official trip to Senegal in mid-flight. He justified the decision on the grounds that, in a moment like this, «the president must be in Poland».
The PiS leader, Jarosław Kaczyński, appeared before the court's headquarters, called what happened a «attack on the Constitutional Tribunal», accused the services under Tusk's control of entering by force and asked Nawrocki to intervene. He even warned that Poland is becoming a police state.
Tusk replied on X that restoring the rule of law after the years of PiS government is a difficult and sometimes painful process that requires firm decisions, and that «there is no other way».
The origin: a ten-year war over the Constitutional Court
The conflict does not begin today. In 2015 PiS, then in power, appointed Constitutional judges in a process that the European Court of Human Rights considered irregular in 2021, and Brussels even came to freeze European funds because of the Polish judicial drift. Since Tusk returned to power in December 2023, his Government does not recognize the legitimacy of much of that court nor publish some of its rulings.
The blockade has worsened in 2026. According to the public television TVP World, the current Sejm has already elected eight judges, but Nawrocki has only accepted the oath of three; one of them, Maciej Berek, took the oath of office in Parliament after the president refused to receive him at the palace. In turn, Święczkowski has refused to allow the judges elected by the current majority to assume functions. Reuters sums up the result: an institution practically paralyzed.
Is it a coup d'état?
It depends on whom you ask, and that is precisely the key to the conflict.
What the Polish right says.
Święczkowski already filed in January 2025 a complaint of some 60 pages before the Public Prosecutor's Office in which he accused Tusk and senior officials of a «systemic» coup d'état: not with tanks in the street, but by neutralizing the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court and the National Council of the Judiciary. For PiS, what happened this Friday is the culmination of that strategy.
What the Government says.
For Tusk's coalition, the problem is exactly the opposite: a court captured by PiS that blocks the judges legally elected. Korwin-Piotrowska had already said on public television that, in her view, Święczkowski is breaking the law by preventing them from judging.
What the facts say. There is no military intervention, the Government continues to be the one that emerged from the ballots in 2023 and the president maintains his functions. What exists is an institutional clash in which each side considers the other illegitimate and which is being settled, for now, with administrative orders, statements and police presence. Whether the measure against Święczkowski is legal will depend on a question that today has no arbiter accepted by both sides: who legitimately commands the Constitutional Court.
The political context: Tusk is playing for everything or nothing
The crisis comes at the worst moment for the prime minister. His coalition has a narrow majority in the Sejm, Minister Katarzyna Pełczyńska-Nałęcz left the Government and the leadership of Polonia 2050 on October 22, and Nawrocki vetoes or blocks a large part of his agenda, from abortion to appointments. Analysts quoted by The Irish Times believe that Tusk, with the 2027 elections on the horizon, has decided to force the clash with Kaczyński and Nawrocki over control of the Constitutional Court.
PiS is also not going through its best moment: it is suffering its biggest split in two decades and Kaczyński sparked controversy this week by suggesting that Poland could negotiate its exit from the EU if it does not reform.
What can happen now
• Two presidents for one court. Święczkowski does not recognize the order and Korwin-Piotrowska is already serving. Any ruling that comes out of the Constitutional Court will be challenged by one of the two sides.
• Nawrocki's response. The president can convene the National Security Council, address the country, or block even more Government laws.
• The street. The gatherings in front of Szucha Avenue may grow this weekend.
• Brussels. The European Commission, which sanctioned PiS over the judicial issue, has so far backed Tusk's line. The European right accuses it of double standards; its reaction will be key.