Poland’s Supreme Administrative Court (NSA) has upheld a decision by the finance ministry to withhold millions of zlotys in state funding from the opposition conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party.
The case is part of a campaign by Donald Tusk’s leftist-liberal government to weaken its political opponents.
The ruling confirms that Finance Minister Andrzej Domański acted lawfully when he refused to release subsidies that had been withheld following alleged irregularities in PiS’s 2023 parliamentary election campaign.
The dispute began in August 2024, when the National Electoral Commission (PKW) rejected PiS’s campaign finance report after identifying approximately 3.6 million zlotys (€838,000) in unauthorised spending. As a consequence, the commission ruled that the party should lose 10.8 million zlotys in public subsidies, reducing the funding it would otherwise have received following the 2023 election.
PiS challenged the decision, pointing to a ruling by a chamber of the Supreme Court that made a decision in its favour.
However, Domański refused to restore the funding, arguing that the chamber’s legal status remained in doubt because it had been established under judicial reforms introduced during PiS’s time in government between 2015 and 2023. The NSA has now sided with the finance minister.
Prime Minister Donald Tusk welcomed the ruling, writing on X:
Just as we said, there is and will be no money for grifters.
Meanwhile PiS has strongly rejected the ruling. Senior party lawmaker Radosław Fogiel accused the authorities of unlawfully depriving the main opposition party of funding to which it was entitled, describing the decision as reflecting “Russian standards.”
The funding dispute has placed PiS under increasing financial pressure. Party leader Jarosław Kaczyński has repeatedly appealed to supporters for donations, warning that the loss of public subsidies has created serious financial difficulties.
The ruling against PiS comes as no surprise, as the Donald Tusk-led leftist-liberal coalition government has been attempting to undermine PiS with political, financial, and judicial means.
Jarosław Kaczyński has called the decision to withhold state funds as “scandalous,” and was intended to “eliminate the only strong opposition party” in the style of Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
However, because of Tusk’s close standing to EU institutions—he was the head of the European Council, as well as president of the EU establishment European People’s Party—the Polish prime minister’s actions have not been scrutinised by Brussels.
