Overview
- Party leader Jarosław Kaczyński set a deadline for MPs to disband internal groups and sign a loyalty declaration, and when crisis talks failed more than 30 MPs left or were expelled from PiS.
- Former prime minister Mateusz Morawiecki led the dissent with a moderate, pro‑business faction called Entwicklung Plus and says about 40 MPs follow him, a figure that conflicts with Kaczyński’s count.
- The split was triggered by Kaczyński’s March choice of hardliner Przemysław Czarnek as PiS’s 2027 frontrunner, which Morawiecki and his supporters said would push the party too far to the right.
- Friday’s rupture is likely to cost PiS its position as the largest Sejm faction and further fragments the conservative vote, reducing PiS’s standalone path to victory in next year’s election.
- Analysts say the fight exposes a weakening of Kaczyński’s personal control over PiS and could produce new party realignments, with Morawiecki not ruling out forming a separate party and a party council set to formalize membership changes next week.