CPA Letter to U.S. President Joe Biden

Dear Mr. President:

The Coalition of Polish Americans, a non-partisan organization dedicated to promoting the interests of Polish Americans, and whose goal is to advance long-standing friendship and cooperation between both countries, wants to express our deep concern with the ongoing developments since the transition of power to the newly elected government in December 2023. Similar to the United States, Poland has been wrought by severe ideological conflict for several years. From 2015 until 2023, the leftwing opposition has questioned actions of the previous government as illiberal and antidemocratic.
The U.S administration has bought into this ideological discourse and repeatedly criticized the previous Law and Justice government for trying to reform the broken Polish judicial system. This was based on the information provided by the then Polish opposition and did not take into account the reality of the broken judicial system still pervaded by former communists completely unaccountable to the elected Representatives. Judges in Poland elected themselves without any input from legislature, a situation completely separated from the usual practice of checks and balances existing in all other Western democracies.
The Law and Justice government was also reprimanded for trying to reform the Polish media market. The U.S. administration expressed grave concern with the freedom of press in Poland, while other countries like Germany, France, and the USA itself, have much stricter rules concerning foreign media ownership than the Polish law. In December 2023 the new government forced changes to Polish public television, ignoring applicable statutory provisions, and going as far as turning off the signal and putting the television station into receivership. Nevertheless, we have not heard criticism from the USA, even though the current government has the support and control of over 90 percent of the Polish media. Lacking any legal justification, the new government is using “strong men”, in Donald Tusk’s own words, to take control of public media and threatens to do the same with the National Bank of Poland, Constitutional Tribunal and other public institutions.
We understand that our administration hoped to build on well-established relations with Poland under Donald Tusk’s leadership. However, yesterday certain barriers of respect for the law have been breached. On the premises of the Presidential Palace, two opposition members of Sejm were forcefully arrested for the crime non other than fighting corruption, with total disregard for the pardons they had been granted by President Duda. This constituted brutal disregard for standard democratic practices and disrespect for President Duda, twice elected by millions of Poles to be the head of state. It further demonstrates a highly concerning escalation of the internal conflict that threatens the stability of Poland, until now a leader and staunch and dependable U.S. ally in the war in Ukraine. We fear that this escalation is due to the fact that the current government is too dependent on Germany, and that may affect its efforts to help Ukraine.
We call upon the U.S. administration, before it is too late, to show its concern with the developments in Poland and that it expects the Tusk government to adhere to basic democratic standards, to follow the rule of law and Polish constitution, just as it was expected from the previous Polish government.

Respectfully,

Leszek Pawlik, President
Anna Zawadzka, Vice President American Affairs

cc.:

Hon. Antony Blinken
United States Secretary of State

Hon. Chuck Schumer
Majority Leader of the United States Senate