MAIN POINTS
1
The Court of Justice of the European Union delivered a judgment that challenges the primacy of the Polish Constitution in Poland.
2
According to the CJEU, Member States are not empowered to assess on their own whether EU institutions, including the CJEU itself, exceed the powers conferred on them by the Treaties.
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A practical example of how absurd the consequences of the CJEU’s position can be is a recent case involving Hungary, which brought a lawsuit before the CJEU against… the CJEU itself, over an extremely arbitrary judgment it had handed down.
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In its judgment against Poland, the CJEU also manipulates public opinion, overlooking the important nuances of the Polish dispute over the Constitutional Tribunal that has been ongoing since 2015.
Less than a week before Christmas, on December 18, 2025, the Court of Justice of the European Union issued a judgment in response to the European Commission’s complaint alleging a breach of EU treaties by the Republic of Poland. This breach was said to be reflected in the judgments of the Constitutional Tribunal of July 14 (case P 7/20) and of October 7, 2021 (case K 3/21), in which the Polish Constitutional Tribunal held that the CJEU, in adjudicating on the structure of the Polish judiciary, acted ultra vires (Latin: beyond one’s powers), that is, outside the scope of its authority.
As we have already reported, the CJEU agreed with the European Commission’s position and ruled that the Republic of Poland violated treaty provisions.
It should be noted that the ruling was greeted with satisfaction by representatives of Poland’s current governing coalition, as a blow against their predecessors:
The Polish government’s stance, while saddening, is unfortunately not surprising. It is particularly reprehensible that the government of Donald Tusk, campaigning under the banner of “restoring the rule of law,” continues its line of delegitimizing the Polish Constitutional Tribunal, whose task is to safeguard that very rule of law and to prevent the executive branch of government from enacting “statutory lawlessness”—normative acts that are contrary to the Constitution. Something that the government, especially lately, has been carrying out very actively with full support from the European Commission (as, for example, in the judgment of November 12, 2025 in case U 4/25, in which the unconstitutionality of a regulation partially abolishing the principle of random assignment of court cases was declared, or in the already numerous judgments declaring the unconstitutionality of restrictions imposed by the current Minister of Education on religion classes in public schools). Thus, the Tusk government, in the name of short-term gains in the ongoing political struggle, is actively contributing to reducing the level of protection of the constitutional rights and freedoms of Polish citizens.
However, this is not the only negative consequence of our government adopting such a confrontational approach to politics. Perhaps even more significant—and thus more reprehensible, or even disgraceful—is the government applauding another consequence that would result from adopting the CJEU’s position. And this consequence is a serious limitation of Poland’s sovereignty, but also the sovereignty of the remaining member states of the European Union.
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Source of cover photo: Adobe Stock
