Polish prosecutors charge MEP Grzegorz Braun with four criminal offenses over 2025 incidents

Formal indictment presented in Warsaw

Warsaw district prosecutors presented four criminal charges to European Parliament member Grzegorz Braun on 20 August 2026. Dariusz Korneluk, the National Prosecutor, confirmed the legal step during a television broadcast on 21 August. Braun, who heads the Konfederacja Korony Polskiej party, refused to plead guilty and declined to give formal explanations during the hearing. He requested a subsequent questioning date in order to appear alongside his defense counsel. Warsaw District Prosecutor spokesperson Piotr Antoni Skiba stated that the offenses carry statutory penalties between three months and eight years in prison, in addition to potential fines or community sentencing.

Details of the 2025 offenses

The charges address four distinct episodes that took place between April and June 2025. On 30 April 2025, during a political gathering on Plac Wolności in Biała Podlaska, an associate acting under Braun's explicit instructions removed a Ukrainian flag from the balcony of the municipal office, generating 20 PLN in financial loss. On 6 May 2025, Braun seized a European Union flag valued at 388 PLN from the lobby of the Ministry of Industry in Katowice, stomped on it, and later burned it near the Wujek coal mine. Prosecutors categorized both flag takedowns as daring theft under Article 278, Section 3a of the Polish Penal Code.

On 11 June 2025, Braun tore down and destroyed ten PVC panels of an LGBT+ exhibition titled "Jest nas więcej" inside the Sejm main lobby, resulting in 3,690 PLN of property damage. When questioned by reporters at the scene, Braun asserted that he acted to prevent public demoralization. The fourth charge concerns remarks during a televised presidential debate on 28 April 2025, during which Braun targeted the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews by referring to the yellow daffodil emblem of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising remembrance campaign as a symbol of shame.

Parliamentary bans and institutional reactions

Following the destruction of the exhibition inside the Sejm, parliament administration prohibited Braun from entering the parliamentary complex under rules against conduct that compromises legislative dignity. Sejm Marshal Włodzimierz Czarzasty stated that the access ban remains in effect. The formal presentation of charges was enabled by the European Parliament, which voted in late March 2026 to lift Braun's parliamentary immunity following a July 2025 request by the Warsaw-Praga District Prosecutor's Office.

Justice Minister and Prosecutor General Waldemar Żurek commented on the procedural development on social media.

It seems the MEP decided that prosecutorial charges are best accepted in bulk. Four new today, seven in the previous indictment; at this rate of expanding this specific portfolio, he will soon run out of articles in the Penal Code.

Broader legal proceedings

The latest indictment expands an extensive series of legal actions against Braun across Poland. The politician faces seven counts under an earlier indictment regarding the extinguishing of Hanukkah candles inside the Sejm corridor in December 2023 and an unauthorized entry into the National Institute of Cardiology during 2022 pandemic restrictions. In April 2026, the European Parliament lifted his immunity in connection with an incident on 10 July 2025, when Braun blocked an access road during the 84th anniversary of the Jedwabne massacre. The District Prosecutor's Office in Wrocław also maintains an active investigation into his actions at a hospital in Oleśnica.

The prosecutor's office simply does its job. Consistently, without leniency and without looking at political yelling. No one who strikes at the authority of the Polish State with such determination can count on anything being swept under the rug.