The European Parliament has voted to strip right-wing Polish MEP Grzegorz Braun of his EP immunity, clearing the way for the Polish authorities to prosecute him for allegedly inciting racial hatred.
Braun’s Polish parliamentary immunity had already been revoked but his election to the EP in June 2024 granted him EP immunity. That was lifted on May 6.
The MEP, currently a candidate for Poland’s presidential election due on May 18, attracted international condemnation in December 2023 when he used a fire extinguisher to douse candles on a menorah during a Hanukkah Jewish festival celebration in the Polish parliament.
Following the controversial act, Braun defended his actions, saying: “There can be no place for acts of racist, tribal Talmudic worship on Polish soil.”
His Polish parliamentary immunity was then removed.
On May 6 this year, he MEP was also involved in another controversy when he desecrated a European Union flag at the Ministry of Industry in Katowice, southern Poland.
Braun was filmed removing the banner, wiping his shoes on it and later setting it alight outside the building. He posted a video of the incident on X, declaring: “This is Poland, not Brussels.”
– Nie po to ginęli górnicy Kopalni Wujek i inni polegli z rąk władzy sowieckiej, żeby dzisiaj utwierdzany był na ziemiach polskich reżim eurosowiecki❗️
Płonie tutaj kawałek materii z emblematem nieistniejącego państwa, które rości sobie pretensje do zarządzania i pomiatania… pic.twitter.com/ON1NrLacsy
— Grzegorz Braun (@GrzegorzBraun_) May 6, 2025
Braun is currently an unaffiliated MEP as none of the right-wing groups in the EP will have him as a member after what were seen as his anti-Semitic actions over Hanukkah.
The latest such outburst came during a presidential debate on April 28 when he called the daffodil symbol of the Warsaw Jewish Ghetto uprising a “sign of shame and Judaisation of Poland”.
That led the Left’s election candidate Magdalena Biejat to report him to the public prosecutor on suspicion of inciting racial hatred.
Braun was also facing prosecution for his recent actions in Biała Podlaska, eastern Poland, where together with his supporters he took down a Ukrainian flag displayed in solidarity with Kyiv over the Russian invasion, arguing it was an example of how Polish public space and social life were being “Ukrainised”.
He was also facing prosecution for his unauthorised entry onto a hospital ward where he attempted to make a citizen’s arrest of a doctor who had performed an abortion in the ninth month of pregnancy.
The Polish MEP, as well as being a fervent nationalist, is a devout Catholic opposed to abortion and supportive of the return of Latin mass.
In the run-up to the presidential election, Braun was polling between 2 and 4 per cent.
