Jarosław Kaczyński

Lech and Jarosław Kaczyński with their mother.

Kaczyński is the identical twin brother of the late Polish President Lech Kaczyński. Jarosław and Lech were born in Warsaw.[8]

The Kaczyński brothers are sons of Rajmund (an engineer who served as a soldier of the Armia Krajowa in World War II and a veteran of the Warsaw Uprising) and Jadwiga (a philologist at the Polish Academy of Sciences).

As children, Jarosław and Lech Kaczyński starred in the 1962 Polish film The Two Who Stole the Moon (Polish: O dwóch takich, co ukradli księżyc), based on a popular children's story by Kornel Makuszyński.[9]

Kaczyński resides in Warsaw. He has never married, but there were rumours about a close love relationship with one of his unmarried employees, MP Jolanta Szczypińska, before her death in 2018.[10][11] He lived with his ailing mother until her hospitalization.[4] Kaczyński owns no computer and is said to have opened his first bank account only in 2009.[7]

Among many political elites in Poland, including Lech Walęsa, rumours have circulated for years that he is homosexual, apparently confirmed by secret service reports.[12] In 2006, the Polish newspaper Rzeczpospolita reported on communist-era secret service files which documented a discussion on his sexuality. In the files, a former SB (Służba Bezpieczeństwa) officer speculated on Kaczyński's sexual orientation.[13] Relations between Lech Wałęsa and Kaczyński have for many years been strained drawing from their opposite stances regarding Poland's communist past: Wałęsa preferred to focus on the future and "allow the past to remain the past", while the Kaczyński brothers strived to destroy any remnant of the country's former communist networks.[14]

Kaczyński was a graduate of law and administration of Warsaw University, which in 1976 awarded him a PhD in Law. He was the executive editor of the Tygodnik Solidarność weekly from 1989 to 1991.

In 1991, he created the centrist, Christian democratic Centre Agreement party and later became its chairman, remaining in the role until 1998. In the years 1991 to 1993 and since 1997, Kaczyński is a member of the Polish Parliament (Sejm).[15]

In 1991, he worked under direction of President Lech Wałęsa as the head of his presidential chancellery.[16]

President Wałęsa fired Kaczyński, who then led the movement against Wałęsa. During this time an effigy of Wałęsa was burned at a protest organized by Kaczyński.[17]

Polish Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński with Pope Benedict XVI

Kaczyński was the Law and Justice prime ministerial candidate in the September 2005 Polish parliamentary election.[18] However, when the party emerged as winner of the election, he pledged that he would not take the position, expecting that his nomination would reduce the chances of his brother Lech Kaczyński, who was a candidate for the October presidential election. Party-member Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz was appointed Prime Minister.

In the succeeding months, he was a frontbench MP and the leader of his party. Many also described Kaczyński as Poland's most influential politician. He was said to have enormous influence on the Prime Minister's decision-making process. Kaczyński was the architect of the coalition with the populist Self-Defense of the Republic of Poland (Polish: Samoobrona) and the far-right League of Polish Families party.

Critics accuse the first PiS government of allegedly splitting the country over religious and cultural issues and picking "needless fights with Germany and the European Union".[14][19]

Polish Prime Minister Jarosław Kaczyński with U.S. President George W. Bush

Following reports of a rift between Kaczyński and Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, the latter tendered his resignation on 7 July 2006. Kaczyński was appointed prime minister by his brother, Lech Kaczyński, on 10 July, and sworn in on 14 July, following the formation of a cabinet and a confidence vote in the Sejm.[20][21][22]

At the request of his government, Parliament lowered PIT and rent tax. Kaczyński controversially initiated a nationwide program (lustracja) which required thousands of public employees, teachers, and journalists to formally declare whether or not they had collaborated with the security services of the former communist regime.[23] Kaczyński's government was criticized both at home and abroad for poor foreign relationships with Germany and Russia.[24]

Despite gaining votes, Law and Justice lost the parliamentary election on 21 October 2007, finishing a distant second behind pro-European Christian-democratic and conservative liberal Civic Platform. Kaczyński was succeeded as prime minister by Donald Tusk (after which Kaczyński remained chairman of Law and Justice, becoming leader of the opposition).

Jarosław Kaczyński during XIII Economic Forum in Krynica-Zdrój (2013)

Following the death of his brother, Lech Kaczyński, Jarosław announced that he would run for president against Bronisław Komorowski in the presidential elections held on 20 June 2010.[4][25] Joanna Kluzik-Rostkowska headed his electoral campaign staff and the spokesperson was Paweł Poncyljusz. Kaczyński appeared to soften his image during the campaign in order to win centrist voters.[26] The campaign's motto was Poland Comes First.[27] He polled 36.46% of the votes in the first round, against acting president Bronisław Komorowski's 41.54%. In the second round his 46.99% of the votes was defeated by Komorowski's winning 53.01%.

Jarosław Kaczyński and Beata Szydło

In order to win over moderates, rather than running as PiS' candidate for president or prime minister, Kaczyński put forward more moderate PiS members in the 2015 presidential and parliamentary elections. Andrzej Duda ran as PiS presidential candidate, while Beata Szydło was its candidate for prime minister.[28] The manoeuvres paid off, as PiS won both elections.[28] In the case of the parliamentary election, PiS became the first party to win an outright majority since the end of Communism.[29][30] But despite being a very popular leader among PiS' most loyal base, he himself remains unpopular for the wider public, with some polls showing that more Poles think Kaczyński is not trustworthy compared to Duda or Szydło.[28]

Currently, despite formally being just one of the 460 MPs in the Polish Parliament's lower house (Sejm), Kaczyński is amongst the most influential politicians in Poland.[7] He is considered the de facto ruler of Poland, from whom President and Prime Minister take orders.[31] On 19 November 2017, President of the European Council Donald Tusk warned that Kaczyński's leadership played into the Kremlin's hands and endangered the independence of Poland.[32]

Jarosław Kaczyński speaking during the inauguration of a monument to his brother Lech Kaczyński (November 2018, Warsaw)

Kaczyński's project is said to consist of a "moral revolution" culminating in the creation of a "fourth republic" drawing a radical break from the compromises surrounding the fall of communism in Poland[19] and reverting Poland back to its conservative, Roman Catholic roots and away from a multi-cultural styled Western European mainstream. In April 2016, he stated that he is not going to candidate for office of President or Prime Minister of Republic of Poland in upcoming elections.

Drawing from his strong, uncompromising views (specially regarding parts of the political, cultural and media elite, which he sees as remnants or heirs of the former communist networks), Kaczyński is often labelled as "polarizing".[33]

In recent years, he was also known as an activist for animal rights, and, among other things, undertook activities aimed at banning the breeding of fur animals.[34]

In 2019, Kaczyński characterized the LGBT rights movement as a foreign import that threatens the Polish nation. He also stated that everyone must accept Christianity and questioning the Roman Catholic Church in Poland as unpatriotic: "We are dealing with a direct attack on the family and children — the sexualization of children, that entire LBGT movement, gender. This is imported, but they today actually threaten our identity, our nation, its continuation and therefore the Polish state."[35] In the past Kaczynski had described the LGBT movement as a threat to Polish values, and the state itself.[36]

The main character of the political satire web series The Chairman's Ear, chairman Jarosław (depicted by series creator Robert Górski), is modeled on Kaczyński.[37]

• Janina Goss
• Catholic Church in Poland
• Polish nationalism

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Jarosław Kaczyński.

• (in Polish) Official Website of Jarosław Kaczyński