{"id":8739,"date":"2026-05-25T09:00:05","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T09:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/8739\/"},"modified":"2026-05-25T09:00:05","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T09:00:05","slug":"polands-right-wing-topples-krakows-liberal-mayor-in-fresh-blow-to-tusk-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/8739\/","title":{"rendered":"Poland\u2019s right-wing topples Krak\u00f3w\u2019s liberal mayor in fresh blow to Tusk \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Nearly 30 percent of eligible voters took part in Sunday&#8217;s referendum, which had a 26.98 percent validity threshold. Of those who voted, 97.93 percent backed removing the mayor, while just under 2.1 percent opposed it. In a <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/Miszalski_\/status\/2058773440832708750\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">post<\/a> on X, Miszalski\u00a0accepted the results, emphasizing &#8220;local democracy is precisely about residents having the final say.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNot everything was achieved as I had intended,&#8221; he added. &#8220;I also know that some decisions, and the emotions surrounding them, caused many residents to lose trust in me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The referendum results represent a major victory for PiS and Confederation, who are casting the recall in Krak\u00f3w as the first in a broader campaign to challenge liberal urban governments. Tusk&#8217;s Civic Coalition party controls the capital city Warsaw and the majority of regional capitals, and by taking aim at the local administrations, Poland&#8217;s right-wing sees a way of challenging the prime minister&#8217;s rule at the national level.<\/p>\n<p>In a rare <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/OficjalnyJK\/status\/2058637121703862589\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">post<\/a> on X, PiS leader Jaros\u0142aw Kaczy\u0144ski\u00a0hailed\u00a0the results in Krak\u00f3w, which he said were &#8220;only the beginning.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis government is destroying and questioning everything democratic,&#8221; he wrote. &#8220;That is why the people of Krak\u00f3w showed them the red card. I congratulate all Krak\u00f3w residents who refused to be intimidated and are fighting for their city.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>A pre-referendum survey by pollster OGB found that more than 28 percent of voters cited the city\u2019s Low Emissions Zone (LEZ) \u2014 a system introduced by Miszalski\u2019s center-left predecessor Jacek Majchrowski, to limit polluting vehicles access to Krak\u00f3w \u2014 as their top grievance. Even though Krak\u00f3w&#8217;s residents are exempt from the zone&#8217;s rules, campaigners succeeded in presenting the scheme as an undue burden on &#8220;ordinary&#8221; citizens. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Nearly 30 percent of eligible voters took part in Sunday&#8217;s referendum, which had a 26.98 percent validity threshold.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[6256,7035,64,7036,963,964,9,967],"class_list":["post-8739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-donald-tusk","tag-cars","tag-cities","tag-donald-tusk","tag-emissions","tag-jaroslaw-kaczynski","tag-mayors","tag-poland","tag-rafal-trzaskowski"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/poland\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}