The PM’s statement followed a presidential veto that blocked Warsaw from tapping billions in defense loans from the bloc
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, February 26, 2026, Warsaw, Poland © Klaudia Radecka/NurPhoto via Getty Images
[RT] There is “a real threat” that
Poland could leave the EU, Prime Minister Donald Tusk has said, after
the country’s president vetoed a bill that would have allowed Warsaw to
tap billions in defense loans from the bloc.
President Karol
Nawrocki last week vetoed legislation that would have let Warsaw draw
nearly €44 billion ($50 billion) in low-interest EU defense loans, most
earmarked for domestic arms firms. The government responded by convening
an emergency cabinet session, authorizing its defense and finance
ministers to sign the Security Action for Europe (SAFE) agreement
directly, bypassing the veto.
In a post on X on Sunday, Tusk
accused right-wing parties, most of the opposition Law and Justice bloc,
and Nawrocki personally of seeking a “Polexit.” He claimed Russia, US President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement, and European factions led by Hungary’s Viktor Orban want to “smash the EU,” warning that for Poland, “it would be a catastrophe,” and vowing to do “everything” to stop them.
Western officials have long used the threat of alleged Russian
aggression to justify spikes in military spending, including Brussels’
€800 billion ReArm Europe plan and NATO members’ pledge to raise defense
budgets to 5% of GDP. Moscow has dismissed such claims as “nonsense.”
NATO’s
European members have scrambled to meet Washington’s targets, while the
EU has struggled to revive its defense industry and found purchases of
US weapons for Ukraine increasingly costly.
One of the EU’s
primary tools for addressing all three goals is the SAFE program.
Introduced by the European Commission last year, is allows the bloc to
borrow €150 billion on global markets to finance member-state loans for
defense projects.
The political standoff between Nawrocki and Tusk
is not new. In January 2025, Nawrocki, then an opposition presidential
candidate, joined a farmers’ protest outside the European Commission
office in Warsaw against EU environmental rules and Ukrainian food
imports. Donald Tusk accused him of trying to push Poland out of the
bloc.