Grzegorz Braun, a Polish MEP and presidential candidate, was stripped of his European Parliament immunity, paving the way for prosecution over a series of inflammatory incidents, according to Euractiv.
The decision, ratified by the European Parliament on Tuesday, allows Polish authorities to pursue charges of religious insult, public disorder, and destruction of property linked to Braun’s controversial protests in 2023.
The most high-profile charge stems from Braun’s actions on 12 December 2023, when he stormed a Hanukkah ceremony in the Sejm (Polish parliament), extinguishing lit menorah candles while decrying the celebration as a “foreign historical event” unrelated to Polish culture. Braun, then a member of the national parliament, targeted the event organised by the Chabad-Lubavitch movement, accusing the Jewish group of promoting “divisive narratives” about Poland’s wartime history.
Additional charges relate to Braun disrupting a Holocaust memorial lecture at the German Historical Institute in Warsaw, where he denounced claims of Polish collaboration with Nazi Germany, and removing an LGBT-themed Christmas tree from a Kraków court in what he called a defence of “traditional values”.
Braun, elected to the European Parliament in June 2024 as a member of the Confederation party, had leveraged his immunity to delay proceedings. His presidential campaign, built on anti-LGBT, anti-EU, and nationalist rhetoric, polarised Polish voters ahead of October’s election.
The case highlights tensions over memory politics and religious freedom in Poland, where the ruling centrist coalition has sought to mend ties with Jewish communities strained under the previous nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) government.
The removal of immunity also coincides with recent actions by the MEP. Braun accused the EU of “trampling on the lives, health, and property of Poles.”
The miners of the Wujek Mine and others who fell at the hands of Soviet authorities did not die so that today a Eurosoviet regime could be entrenched on Polish soil! […] A piece of fabric with the emblem of a nonexistent state, which claims the right to control and trample on the lives, health, and property of Poles, is burning here.
Braun also pulled down an EU flag and wiped his shoes with it, according to Polsat. The incident took place in the building of the Ministry of Industry in Katowice.
