Poland's President Is No Friend of the Opposition

It looks to the whole world, and even to the battered Polish opposition, as though President Andrzej Duda took the country a step back from the brink of catastrophe by vetoing bills that would have put Polish courts under the governing party's control. I may be cynical, but it looks like a Russian-style bait-and-switch operation by the Law and Justice (PiS) party to me.

On Monday, both PiS leaders and its opponents, including former Polish President Lech Walesa, showed surprise at Duda's short speech in which he announced the veto. After all, Duda was backed by the PiS when he won the presidency in 2015, and he's largely followed the party line since. Prime Minister Beata Szydlo complained that the president's move slowed down a necessary judicial reform but vowed that the parliamentary majority would not back down.