PiS has tried to use the case of the two former MPs to highlight their charge that Donald Tusk’s new government is running roughshod over the rule of law, also pointing out the new administration’s takeover of the public media, the replacement of senior prosecutors tied to PiS and an upcoming effort to remove judges the government says were improperly installed by the former PiS administration.
Duda has also seized on their ouster, sending the budget bill to be examined by the Constitutional Tribunal, a top court, because the two were not allowed to vote.
But so far the effort isn’t turning around Law and Justice’s political fortunes.
The party is losing support and is now well below the 34.5 percent it won in the October election. POLITICO’s poll of polls shows PiS with 30 percent support, 1 percentage point behind Tusk’s Civic Coalition.
The fight over Kamiński and Wąsik is only one part of a much broader battle between the new coalition government and PiS.
The Tusk government’s next target is likely the Constitutional Tribunal, a body that PiS stuffed with loyalist judges and which the government says is no longer a court of law.
In the next weeks, the legislature may vote to remove five judges the government says were improperly appointed by Duda; there is also talk of an effort to amend the constitution to reform the tribunal.