{"id":39805,"date":"2026-07-27T09:48:21","date_gmt":"2026-07-27T07:48:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ordoiuris.pl\/komentarz\/prezydent-zawetowal-ustawe-o-homozwiazkach-kotula-zapowiada-jak-nie-drzwiami-to-oknem\/"},"modified":"2026-07-27T12:25:38","modified_gmt":"2026-07-27T10:25:38","slug":"polands-president-vetoes-the-same-sex-unions-bill-kotula-vows-if-not-through-the-door-then-through-the-window","status":"publish","type":"komentarze","link":"https:\/\/ordoiuris.pl\/en\/comments\/polands-president-vetoes-the-same-sex-unions-bill-kotula-vows-if-not-through-the-door-then-through-the-window\/","title":{"rendered":"Poland\u2019s President Vetoes the Same-Sex Unions Bill. Kotula Vows: \u2018If Not Through the Door, Then Through the Window\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Last week, President Karol Nawrocki vetoed the government\u2019s Act on the Status of the Closest Person in a Relationship and the Cohabitation Agreement. The President\u2019s veto, however, is not the end of the fight to save marriage and the family. The government and its support base in the LGBT movements are already preparing further offensives. This is a real war over normalcy. And we are in the very middle of it.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was to be the beginning of an ideological revolution<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The title of the act was meant to conceal its revolutionary character. There was a single aim: to strip the marriage of a woman and a man of its special character and its claim to special support from the state. As a result, any domestic community would already count as a \u201cfamily.\u201d Soon this would also include same-sex arrangements with adopted children\u2014at first only those that had adopted children abroad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The act blocked by the President was to grant a range of marital privileges to informal relationships\u2014including same-sex unions. The scale of this revolution is best illustrated by a single figure: in order to introduce the new institution, the government had to prepare amendments to 238 statutes currently in force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The daily Gazeta Wyborcza linked the President\u2019s veto to the petition we submitted to the head of state, bearing the signatures of more than 62,000 Poles. Yet the petition was not everything. To the Chancellery of the President, to the desks of the country\u2019s deputies and senators, to the inboxes of popular journalists\u2014for months we sent our analyses, argument summaries, and extracts of unambiguous statistical data to all of them. All of this so that opposition to the destruction of marriage could rest on a firm foundation of facts and law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our great effort and mobilization were rewarded with the halting of the act. This is a serious blow to the credibility of Donald Tusk\u2019s government, which had placed the matter of \u201csame-sex civil partnerships\u201d among its priorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The battle over the identity of the family in Poland is only just beginning<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

President Karol Nawrocki\u2019s veto, however, is not the end of the fight to save marriage and the family. The government and its support base in the LGBT movements are already preparing further offensives. This is a real war over normalcy. And we are in the very middle of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Katarzyna Kotula, the minister in Tusk\u2019s government responsible for satisfying the needs of the LGBT lobby, has already announced that the presidential veto \u201cis not a blockade, but a delay in changing the law.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018I am not deviating from the course I have chosen. If not through the door, then through the window,\u2019 she assured, announcing a change of strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She stated that, following the President\u2019s veto, further talks about \u201ccivil partnerships\u201d make no sense. Now the left will fight openly for \u201cfull marriage equality.\u201d And in parallel, the government is pushing to recognize \u201csame-sex marriages\u201d in Poland by presenting them as a fait accompli\u2014bypassing parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This means one thing: although we have won a very important battle, the decisive struggle is only just beginning!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We reveal the strategy of the government and the LGBT lobbyists<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The script of the ideological revolution is perfectly well known, because many countries around the world have already been through it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First \u201ccivil partnerships.\u201d Then \u201cmarriage equality\u201d and adoption by same-sex couples. Next, publicly funded in vitro<\/em> fertilization for lesbians and surrogacy (the trade in children) for gay men. It is not without reason that all 22 European countries that changed the legal definition of marriage began precisely with civil partnerships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This revolutionary plan of LGBT circles always ends the same way\u2014in the suffering of children who are denied the right to have a mom and a dad in the name of the selfish whims of two men or two women; in the degradation of the institution of marriage and the destabilization of family life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fortunately, we have managed to halt this process for now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The President\u2019s decision was not made in a vacuum. It was preceded by two years of analytical work by Ordo Iuris lawyers, numerous publications, conferences, and public appearances, as well as a powerful social mobilization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the beginning of July, we submitted to the President an extensive legal opinion<\/a> on both acts, and a petition calling for a veto<\/a>, signed by 62,000 Poles, was delivered to the Chancellery of the President.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Justifying his decision, the President said that \u201cas the guardian of the Constitution\u201d he cannot accept \u201ca solution that would lead to the loss of the special status of marriage, defined in Article 18 of the Constitution as a union of a woman and a man.\u201d He emphasized at the same time that \u201cmarriage, which best safeguards the permanence of the family, cannot become one of many equivalent options offered by the state administration.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Can the state grant almost the same public privileges to persons who do not take on comparable obligations and do not guarantee a similar permanence of their relationship? This would be a solution unjust to married couples, who assume long-term responsibility, care for family members, and bear the resulting social and economic costs,\u2019 the President explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It would be hard to find a better summary of this dispute. Constitutional and social arguments\u2014dismissed and ridiculed for years by the supporters of the revolution\u2014rang out with full force from the lips of the head of state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The presidential veto is also our achievement!<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

This is proof that solid analytical work and the voice of tens of thousands of ordinary Poles carry real weight\u2014that it was worth consistently supplying the public with arguments in defense of marriage for two years. This victory is proof that a well-organized social campaign and the analytical work connected with it, together with dozens of meetings with politicians and the media, can hold back the powerful forces standing behind the government and the LGBT lobbyists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As early as the fall of 2024, we took part in the public consultations<\/a> on the original version of the bill. At that time, we demonstrated that the bill was contrary to the Constitution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A year later, those in power announced a \u201cnew\u201d bill. They used the term \u201cstatus of the closest person\u201d instead of \u201ccivil partnerships,\u201d trying to mislead the President and the public. That very same day, we exposed this manipulation at a press conference<\/a> and published another analysis: \u201cApparent Equality, Real Destruction<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later, we took part in sittings of a committee of the Sejm (the lower house of Poland\u2019s parliament), where we recalled that for more than 20 years the Supreme Court has consistently pointed, in its opinions, to the incompatibility of solutions of this kind with the Constitution. On the eve of the final vote, we published an extensive commentary on Katarzyna Kotula\u2019s Sejm address<\/a>, breaking down one by one the most frequently repeated slogans and catchphrases of the act\u2019s supporters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, at the beginning of July, we submitted to the President of the Republic of Poland a critical legal opinion<\/a>, in which we invoked a number of arguments for the necessity of vetoing the act.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A petition calling for a veto<\/a>, signed by 62,000 Poles, was also delivered to the Chancellery of the President.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The veto closes one chapter of our struggle. But the attack on marriage continues.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government is introducing \u2018same-sex marriages\u2019 through the back door<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Our victory on the matter of \u201ccivil partnerships\u201d is only the beginning of the battle in defense of the identity of marriage in Poland.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In line with Katarzyna Kotula\u2019s announcements, the government machine is not waiting for a new act. In parallel, an attempt is under way to introduce same-sex unions into Polish law entirely outside parliament\u2014by presenting them as a fait accompli.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The chosen tool for this is so-called transcription\u2014that is, the entry into Polish civil status registers of foreign marriage certificates containing the details of persons of the same sex.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two rulings became the pretext. First, the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) of November last year\u2014delivered in excess of the European Union\u2019s competences, because family law, including the definition of marriage, was never conferred on the Union and remains the exclusive domain of the member states. Then the March judgment of the Supreme Administrative Court (NSA), ordering the transcription of the German \u201cmarriage\u201d certificate of two men.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is worth remembering that Poland has no system of binding precedent\u2014such an individual ruling is binding solely in that one case and does not change the law for anyone else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On top of this, in May the Minister of Digital Affairs used a regulation to change\u2026 the official template of the marriage certificate. In the boxes where a woman and a man had previously been entered, an option appeared: \u201cMan\/Woman (select as appropriate).\u201d By means of an ordinary regulation\u2014an act of the lowest rank in the hierarchy of sources of law\u2014an attempt is thus being made to circumvent the Constitution and the Family Code. A form is meant to change what could not be changed by statute.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our lawyers also revealed documents<\/a> showing that the Ministry of Family is pressuring the Social Insurance Institution (ZUS), the Agricultural Social Insurance Fund (KRUS), and other pension and benefit institutions to grant marital benefits to same-sex unions that formalized their relationship abroad.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government is therefore unlawfully exerting pressure on nearly 50,000 officials, who are being forced into actions incompatible with the Constitution and the law in force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And private employers are already waiting in line, expected to begin registering same-sex partners for health insurance as \u201cfamily members\u201d of the employee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the face of the government\u2019s unlawful actions, we had to take it upon ourselves to help local government officials and civil servants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is why we have prepared a legal guide for officials, heads of Civil Registry Offices, and local government officials<\/a> that provides an orderly analysis of the legal situation. In it, we demonstrate step by step that the head of a Civil Registry Office (USC) has a duty to refuse the transcription of a foreign same-sex union\u2014and that it is not the refusal but rather the carrying out of the transcription contrary to the statute that exposes the official to legal liability. We also address in it the most common arguments of the other side.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We called on local government officials to mount a \u201crebellion for the Constitution\u201d during a press conference in front of the Palace of Culture and Science<\/a>, where the voices of Ordo Iuris and Center for Life and Family experts were backed by Warsaw city councilors. During the event, we stressed that the demand to carry out transcription rests solely on a regulation and a single court ruling. We recalled that neither regulations nor court judgments have law-making force.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We also declared that our lawyers stand ready to provide free legal assistance to all officials who might face any consequences for refusing the unlawful transcription of a \u201csame-sex marriage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A decisive battle lies ahead! Together we will win<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

The coming months will be decisive for the future of the Polish family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The radicals on the left will certainly not give up. Neither can we!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later this month, a hearing will take place before Poland\u2019s Constitutional Tribunal concerning the interpretation of the provisions invoked by the supporters of the transcription of same-sex unions. The Ordo Iuris Institute is, of course, joining these proceedings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have already submitted to the Constitutional Tribunal a \u2018friend of the court\u2019 opinion<\/a> (amicus curiae<\/em>), putting forward a range of arguments for the obvious unconstitutionality of any attempts to impose on Civil Registry Offices the transcription of foreign documents recognizing a same-sex couple as a \u201cmarriage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We have also published a draft bill<\/a> that will unambiguously close off the route to the transcription of foreign documents recognizing same-sex couples as marriages and to the adoption of children by such couples.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our critical opinion<\/a> was also delivered to the Ministry of Family as part of the consultations on a regulation intended to bring about the recognition in Poland of same-sex unions formalized abroad\u2026 even without any official transcription!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attorney Rafa\u0142 Dorosi\u0144ski \u2013 member of the Board of the Ordo Iuris Institute<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Source of cover photo: <\/em> iStock<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n


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