Polish Nationalists Win Big After Anti-LGBT Campaign

Reuters reports:

Poland’s ruling conservative nationalist party won parliamentary elections on Sunday, a result that likely will lead it to seek to exert even more control over the country’s judiciary and deepen a showdown with the European Union.

Preliminary results showed the Law and Justice party won about 44% of the vote, giving it a majority in the 460-seat lower house, the Sejm. In previous elections in 2015, it won 38% of the vote.

It was a convincing win for the Law and Justice party, which grounded its campaign in a message of social conservatism, including anti-gay rhetoric, and social welfare spending.

Yahoo News reports:

The triumph by the Law and Justice (PiS) party followed a campaign focused on a raft of new welfare measures coupled with attacks on LGBT rights and Western values.

Terming the victory a “huge success”, PiS leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski [photo], widely regarded as Poland’s ultimate powerbroker, said his party had “obtained a mandate to continue our good change… to continue to change Poland.”

Confederation, a new far-right libertarian coalition known for its anti-EU views, also made it over the five percent threshold to enter parliament with 6.81 percent for 11 seats.