Amazing protests tonight against the new abortion law all across Poland, including some small towns. Here is Mogilno:
Many of the protests are in front of churches or church property. Impossible to imagine 20 years ago, before the church became aligned with the current ruling party. Used to be seen as a neutral, unifying national institution

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More from @anneapplebaum

26 Oct
Bydgoszcz, right now
Thousands of people. Never seen anything like this here before
Protest is for reproductive rights, but not only
Read 6 tweets
25 Oct
Abortion was banned in Poland already: exceptions were made for rape, incest, a mother in danger of dying and fetuses so malformed they wouldn't survive. The new law takes that away; it will force women to give birth to babies that will die. That's the only point of it.
The previous set of rules was long accepted as a "compromise" between religious and non-religious Poles. The change is wildly unpopular, with support in the single digits. It is possible because the Constitutional Tribunal was illegally and unconstitutionally altered.
People are protesting both the level of disrespect shown to women who would, by definition, be enduring a personal tragedy, as well as the illegal assault on the courts.
Read 4 tweets
23 Oct
Nothing said at the debate matters more than this: If Trump politicizes the civil service, American government is finished. Someone's unqualified second cousin will be making important decisions about water quality or food safety instead of a scientist. washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
this is the first thing - the very first thing - that authoritarian leaders do when they take power: Replace all the competent people with lackeys. Trump didn't know enough about government to do it in his first term, but he will do it if he wins a second one.
The politicization of the CDC has already begun. Inspectors-general and watchdogs are being removed. Trump's team of political appointees us already stuffed with incompetents and people with conflicts of interest. This is one more step in the wrong direction.
Read 4 tweets
20 Oct
Wow, I missed the context of this, which is worse than I thought. Trump was talking about how he could extort money out of companies like Exxon. Exact quote: “How are you doing? How’s energy coming? When are you doing the exploration? Oh, you need a couple of permits?”
This is so close in spirit to things that we know for a fact he has said (to the Ukrainian president for example) that the CEO of Exxon rushed to deny it happened
reuters.com/article/usa-el…
Read 4 tweets
15 Oct
Mark your calendars: Today we have witnessed the first major political arrest in Poland since 1989. A prominent government critic, a lawyer, has been taken into custody on dubious charges, to do with business transactions a decade ago. Police are now searching his house.
The arrest of Roman Giertych represents another blow against the rule of law in Poland. For background - I wrote about the harassment of Poland's independent judges here:

theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/…
Giertych was the lawyer for an Austrian businessman who accused the ruling party's leader, Jaroslaw Kaczynski, of defrauding him, and who also leaked embarassing tapes of Kaczynski talking about his business interests dw.com/en/kaczynski-t…
Read 8 tweets

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