Prime Minister Donald Tusk is a man of many talents, and during today’s press conference he not only acted as a psychologist, but also served up a real acrobatic performance to journalists and the audience. After being asked by a female journalist about his words about Donald Trump being ‘recruited by the Russian services 30 years ago’, he was squirming, whimpering, started talking about Mariusz Blaszczak, and then stated that he had ‘never made the suggestion’ that the President-elect of the United States even had agentic links with the Kremlin.

Few people today would want to be in the shoes of Donald Tusk, Radosław Sikorski, Anne Applebaum or Bogdan Klich, not to mention a sizable group of American celebrities. Nevertheless, Prime Minister Donald Tusk has an undoubted talent for… acrobatics. And certainly the verbal one.

Trump and his dependence on Russian services today is no longer in question. This is not my assumption; it is the result of an investigation by the US services. The US services do not rule out that Trump was even recruited by the Russian services 30 years ago

— he said at a meeting in Bytom in the first half of 2023.

These words are eagerly reminded of the Prime Minister by the internet users.

Tusk - prime minister, amateur psychologist and acrobat all in one? Not only that, but the journalists are also asking about it. A representative of the editorial board of the ‘Solidarity Weekly’ (‘Tygodnik Solidarność’) wanted to know how he imagined cooperation with the USA after statements of this kind, both his own and those of Minister Sikorski or Senator Klich.

Prime Minister Donald Tusk first started off by playing psychologist after this question:

We are not going to fool the world; everything is more or less clear. As for President Trump, we have his term of office in mind. I was not only an observer, but also a participant in meetings that also concerned relations with Russia. President Trump has one characteristic that makes it easy to understand his intentions, views or emotions. He is an open-minded man, probably saying what he thinks.

He later added:

Therefore, a different type of approach to Putin, Russia and the situation in Ukraine, a different one in President Trump, a different one in President Biden, was even obvious. I was not, nomen omen, discovering America when I said that President Trump seems on this scale more pro-Russian than President Biden. And perhaps that is going to have its serious consequences.

But, as I said, President Trump (…) can take us by surprise with his decisions or manoeuvres. So let’s wait, first of all, for this electoral process to be accomplished and for the first decisions to be made

— he stated cautiously, while still not answering this precise question.

Attack on Blaszczak

Later, he addressed the Law and Justice Party, and in particular the former head of the Ministry of Defence, Mariusz Blaszczak.

I also don’t really understand, you know, this excitement on the part of some opposition politicians. Such excitement and such immaturity, which makes some politicians, it seems, Minister Błaszczak showed off with the most impressive statement, such a very non-sovereign one, which suggests that events in other countries would influence who governs in Poland

— he stated.

I don’t want to use words that are too strong and heavy. But who governs in Poland is decided by Polish voters. American voters decide who governs in the USA. We will respect the democratic verdict in the USA no matter what. Sympathies and antipathies have nothing to do with it. And we expect the same, especially from Polish politicians, to recognise that all countries, even the most powerful, will respect the verdict of the Polish voters without question. (…)

— he added.

I hope that next time, Law and Justice politicians will bite their tongue before they talk such nonsense. Frankly speaking, when I heard what Mr Blaszczak was saying, I thought: it was worth winning the elections in Poland if only so that such people would not be responsible, for example, for Poland’s military security, because it was embarrassing and very shameful for the former Minister of National Defence to talk such nonsense. It is in their interest that they at least know how to keep their mouths shut when they have nothing to say otherwise

— stressed the Prime Minister.

I apologise, but my question was not about former Minister Blaszczak’s statement, but about your statement that Donald Trump may have outright agent ties with Moscow

— responded the journalist.

No, I never made that kind of suggestion. On the other hand, all statements which would suggest that Poland may be governed by someone who pleases the president of this or that country, de facto disqualify the authors of such statements. I have my views, my emotions, and I will be guided here by the interests of Poland. Using my experience and good relations with most European and world leaders, I think I will effectively look after Polish interests

— argued the Prime Minister.

Szydło: For Tusk, lying is a natural reflex

Tusk’s statements: from 2023 and from today’s conference, were commented on the X platform by the opposition politicians.

Tusk has been caught brazenly lying many times, but his denial of the statement about ‘Trump recruited by the Russians’ is a new level of Tusk lies. He is, after all, well aware that the recording of this statement is on his own YouTube channel. And yet today he lied at the conference without hesitation. For Tusk, lying is a natural reflex

— wrote Beata Szydło, Law and Justice MEP and former Prime Minister.

A journalist pressed Tusk today to refer to his own words about Trump’s alleged role as a Russian agent, and as if nothing had happened, he lied that he had never uttered such words. Disgusting fellow. See for yourselves

— commented Law and Justice MP Sebastian Kaleta.

What is there to add? That the ‘golden advice’ directed at Law and Justice politicians today was not applied by Donald Tusk to himself and his own party when he was in opposition himself. When the hybrid war on the Polish-Belarusian border began, the then opposition had nothing clever to say, yet it did not remain silent. When Russia launched a full-scale attack on Ukraine, and Poland provided gigantic support from the very beginning (both at government level and from Polish citizens), the opposition of the time did not keep silent either, and not only that, it did shout rather unwise things. It was then that General Pytel thundered from the cover of ‘GW’ that ‘Russia is already here’, and politicians of the then opposition heated up this narrative.

What’s more, Prime Minister Donald Tusk has shown that he also has nothing clever to say, if only about the former head of the Ministry of Defence, because as it happens, the state-of-the-art Western weapons that the current government is now boasting about are former ‘Błaszczak’s hysterical purchases’. This is worth appreciating, as the current leadership of the Ministry of Defence, or at least part of it, is more preoccupied with pursuing Macierewicz than modernising the army.

The head of government also slightly missed the truth when he claimed that ‘it was worth winning the elections’. Let us remember that, numerically, Law and Justice won them, Donald Tusk formed the government only because he managed to ‘get along’ with the other groupings so far in opposition. Not everyone who did not want Law and Justice in power wanted Tusk in power and the Prime Minister should be quite careful in attributing the ‘win’ in the elections to himself.

One final point - since when has Prime Minister Donald Tusk been such an ardent supporter of Poland’s sovereignty and when did he understand that the voters decide who governs a democratic country? What about his MEPs, who between 2015 and 2023 showered the EP and EU institutions with tons of resolutions and like Jehovah’s witnesses asking: ‘Do you have a moment to talk about Jesus?’, they asked: ‘Do you have a moment to talk about democracy/rule of law in Poland and how it is being destroyed by a government that does not suit us?’. What about all the supporters of the current government, who for the last eight years have gazed hopefully at Frans Timmermans, who rejoiced when foreign leaders such as Emmanuel Macron (who was, however, only then running for president) said something bad about the PiS government?

Who only remembers from the 2016 NATO summit in Warsaw that the then US President Barack Obama mentioned the rule of law? What about EC President Ursula von der Leyen, who, after the Italian elections, openly threatened Giorgia Meloni before the politician had even managed to become head of government? Was the effort of ‘Bart’ Staszewski, who alerted the democratic world to the issue of ‘LGBT-free zones’, in vain?

One thing has to be awarded to Prime Minister Tusk: he is an excellent acrobat (at least verbally), because surely someone will fall for his ‘ stunts’. And that it will be someone who counted on Kamala Harris winning without actually knowing anything about either herself or her achievements, but only because Kamala Harris is not Donald Trump? Well, what the hell.

Tłum. K.J.