Interpreting Two Recent Polls About Poles’ Declining Faith In The US’ Reliability

This is a reflection of Poland’s fiercely partisan society whereby supporters of the ruling liberal-globalist coalition follow Prime Minister Tusk’s lead in regarding Trump as a Russian agent and correspondingly consider the US unreliable under his leadership.

Two recent polls showed that the majority of Poles, who are normally among the most pro-American people on the planet, no longer have faith in the US’ reliability as an ally. The poll commissioned by Rzeczpospolita and carried out by the SW Research agency found that 53.2% no longer consider the US a reliable ally while the one commissioned by Radio Zet and carried out by IBRiS found that 54.1% feel this way to some extent. These recent polls require interpretation since Poland as a state is still a top US ally.

For starters, Polish society is divided almost equally between liberal-globalists and conservatives as proven by the last presidential election where conservative President Karol Nawrocki narrowly won the second round with just 50.89% of the vote. Parliament earlier shifted from conservative rule to liberal-globalist rule after fall 2023’s elections, which resulted in the return of Donald Tusk as Prime Minister. He previously defamed Trump as a Russian agent and his “fellow travelers” follow his lead in believing that.

They accordingly don’t believe that the US is a reliable ally under his leadership, so in other words, the vast majority of those who signaled as much in the recent polls are simply making a partisan point. That doesn’t account, however, for the first poll indicating that only 29.9% of Poles consider US to be a reliable ally (16.9% had no opinion) and the second one indicating that 35.4% feel this way to some extent (10.5% had no opinion). This data suggests that some conservatives have soured on the US.

The ones most likely to have done so probably aren’t among supporters of the “Law & Justice” leading opposition party, which is part of Poland’s ruling duopoly, but are supporters of its populist-nationalist Crown and Confederation opposition ones. A reputable poll from December respectively indicated that they have the support of 11.18% and 10.67% of Poles, so slightly over one-fifth of the electorate, thus making them the kingmakers ahead of fall 2027’s next parliamentary elections if this trend holds.

Crown is led by Grzegorz Braun, who local media reported had figured into US Ambassador Tom Rose’s recent meeting with Law & Justice leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who was told that “a government in which Grzegorz Braun would have any involvement cannot count on the support of the United States.” Rose earlier condemned Braun, but not by name, after he disrupted a memorial service at Auschwitz. Rose is Jewish so it’s reasonable that he’d dislike Braun’s highly contentious takes on the Holocaust and Jews.

Returning to the two recent polls, the 11.18% of Crown supporters coincides with most of the 13.7% of Poles who on average hold no opinion about the US’ reliability, with the remainder likely consisting of some Confederation supporters. The same poll which showed those two populist-nationalist opposition parties commanding over one-fifth of the electorate also showed that Law & Justice enjoys 31.21% of support, which aligns with the 32.65% of Poles who still consider the US to be a reliable ally.

Poles’ declining faith in the US’ reliability as an ally is therefore a reflection of Poland’s fiercely partisan society whereby supporters of the ruling liberal-globalist coalition follow Prime Minister Tusk’s lead in regarding Trump as a Russian agent and correspondingly consider the US unreliable under his leadership. For as sensationalist as this statistic may seem, it has no effect on bilateral ties at the state-to-state level, since Poland plays an indispensable role in the US’ new National Security Strategy for containing Russia.