Lawmakers and activists are warning that nationalist candidate Karol Nawrocki’s win in the Polish presidential election represents a “defeat” for women’s rights and further threatens abortion access in Poland.

Nawrocki, a self-described football hooligan backed by the right-wing nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) party — and by U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration — won Poland’s presidential election last weekend, narrowly beating centrist Rafał Trzaskowski.

His victory deals a significant loss to the current government, led by centrist Donald Tusk, and represents “a devastating blow to anyone fighting for reproductive freedom,” said Nika Kovač, coordinator for the My Voice, My Choice campaign, which is working to improve access to abortion across the EU.

“As a staunch conservative with strong nationalist backing, Nawrocki is expected not only to uphold but potentially tighten Poland’s already draconian abortion laws,” Kovač said in a written statement. “His win slams the door on hope for political reform in the near future — and locks in a future where women’s lives remain expendable.”

Poland has some of the strictest abortion rules in Europe. The PiS party tightened the country’s abortion laws to a near-total ban in 2020, making the procedure allowed only in cases of rape or incest, or if the life of the woman is endangered. Nawrocki has said he would not sign any bills expanding the right to abortion.

Tusk’s 2023 campaign, which pushed out PiS from government after eight years of rule, heavily relied on his commitment to liberalize abortion laws.

But activists said they have become embittered with his promises, after attempts to ease the strict regulations hit a political wall as the opposition and incumbent President Andrzej Duda blocked several of his efforts.

A bill to decriminalize abortion up to the 12th week of pregnancy narrowly failed to pass in the parliament and a parliamentary vote to stop prosecuting people who assist with abortions failed because of conservatives within his ruling coalition. 

“We are quite disillusioned and disappointed,” said Kinga Jelinska, an activist from women’s rights and abortion group Abortion Dream Team and co-founder of Women Help Women. “I am not surprised that many people did not go to vote in this election … These are the votes that were missing in comparison to 2023, because people are disillusioned and they don’t want to go and vote and then have nothing delivered.”

Now, Nawrocki’s win means that “there is no chance to change the abortion laws in Poland,” said Polish Member of the European Parliament Joanna Scheuring-Wielgus, from the Socialists and Democrats group. 

Tusk’s efforts have been “effectively paralyzed,” added Kovač. “Even a supportive parliament cannot bypass a president who holds veto power — and Nawrocki has made it clear where he stands (on abortion).”

This does not mean that Polish women will stop fighting for these rights, Scheuring-Wielgus said. “Sooner or later the discussion in Poland on this topic will erupt again. I am convinced of this.”

Hostile environment

It’s not just the failed legislative efforts that anger activists; Jelinska said the current government has repeatedly failed to protect women seeking abortion and doctors performing the procedure from harassment, including at the newly opened Abotak center.

Activists from Abortion Dream Team opened the center in March, right opposite the Polish parliament — the first place in Poland where women can go to access and take abortion pills. But the center has been the target of ongoing attacks and steady harassment since its opening, Jelinska said, and Tusk and Trzaskowski (Warsaw’s mayor) have done nothing about it, she claimed.

“We have not seen any support for our center, even though this is a situation where we actually risk our health to be there,” she said. “It is fake promises, and people are not stupid.”

Doctors and organizations assisting with abortion face constant harassment in Poland. The U.N. Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women concluded last year that women in Poland are facing severe human rights violations due to restrictive abortion laws, with many forced to carry unwanted pregnancies to term, seek unsafe clandestine procedures or travel abroad for legal abortions.

The case of Justyna Wydrzyńska, an activist who was sentenced to eight months of community service for facilitating an abortion in 2023, made international headlines. And in April, Polish MEP Grzegorz Braun stormed a hospital in Poland and threatened a doctor with a citizen’s arrest for performing a legal late-term abortion.

“We also can expect that in the future, there will be more prosecution and more attacks, because this kind of voice gets legitimized in the presidential seat,” Jelinska said.

Amid ongoing challenges, the EU should step up and show solidarity to women in Poland, Left MEP Manon Aubry said. Last month, Aubry was one of the MEPs that traveled to Poland to deliver abortion pills to the Abotak center. She said she is planning to do it again soon.

“It’s part of the role of the European Union,” she said. “When fundamental values of the European Union are under threat — like it is the case in Poland when it comes to women’s rights or to rule of law in general — then it’s our responsibility to stand up and act in solidarity.”

The My Voice, My Choice campaign wants the European Commission to establish a fund to help women who can’t access abortion care in their own country to travel to another with more liberal abortion laws. It successfully gathered the 1 million signatures needed to be considered by the Commission earlier this year. 

The Polish election shows why the campaign is “more essential than ever,” Kovač said. “When the political system fails us, it is movements like ours that must lead the fight.”