President Andrzej Duda as the main factor of the populist crisis of democracy in Poland

In 2015 Andrzej Duda supported by the populist right-wing party Law and Justice was elected for the office of President of Republic of Poland. Later that year Law and Justice won parliamentary elections gaining the majority in the parliament. These events started so called "populist revolution" in Poland that lasted until late 2023 when coalition of oppositional parties won parliamentary election. During that time Andrzej Duda as the reigning President was an active actor and even could be regarded as the main factor of the success of the Law and Justice policy. Duda actively supported the Law and Justice policy to subordinate the judicial power to the party. He appointed three illegally elected judges of the Constitutional Tribunal, although the verdict of the Constitutional Tribunal concerning this case was issued the following day and the date of the Tribunal hearing was publicly known. He also approved the bill that allowed Sejm (first chamber of the Polish parliament) to elect members (judges) of the National Council of the Judiciary ("KRS") what has been universally regarded as against the rules of the Polish Constitution. The National Council of the Judiciary has very important right, as all the judges (except the judges of the Constitutional Tribunal) should be appointed for an indefinite period by the President on the motion of the Council. The European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Justice of the European Union regard The National Council of the Judiciary in the new constitution ("neo-KRS") as incorrectly constructed and the procedure of the appointment of judges has been recognized as flawed, so the persons appointed in such procedure have been considered as not meeting the standards for recognition as judges ("neo-judges"). Duda has been ignoring the verdicts of the mentioned European courts and has appointed many new "neo-judges". Moreover, Duda approved the bill that allowed Ministry of Justice to freely nominate the presidents of the courts. He also appointed for the office of the President of Supreme Court a "neo-judge" Małgorzata Manowska who should not be even appointed to the position of the judge of the Supreme Court. President Duda also approved many other bills prepared by the Law and Justice government: subordinating public prosecutor's office to the Ministry of Justice, devastating education or giving the control on public TV and radio to the Law and Justice which resulted in a propaganda supporting the government. During the presidential electoral campaign in 2019 Duda used anti-LGBT rhetoric when he described LGBT as "ideology, not people". The main objection against President Andrzej Duda is that he could easily stop anti-constitutional "populist revolution" of the Law and Justice. It was only his free decision to illegally appoint three persons to the positions of the Judges of the Constitutional Tribunal. He also could use the veto against bills devastating Polish legal system. Unfortunately, for Andrzej Duda the ratio of his party has been always more important than ratio of his state.