Polish city of Kraków takes action against politician for claiming tourists in video were immigrants

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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

The mayor of Kraków has asked parliament to take disciplinary action against a right-wing opposition MP whose social media account shared a video from the city and claimed it showed immigrants being settled there, but which in fact depicted tourists travelling to a hotel.

The MP in question, Anna Krupka of the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party, has since deleted her social media post, which she blamed on a member of her staff. However, she has refused mayor Aleksander Miszalski’s request to issue an apology.

The video in question shows a group of people pulling luggage through Kraków, Poland’s second-largest city and its biggest tourist hub, at night.

Krupka shared it on her Facebook page last week along with the caption: “No, this is not a trip. These are migrants brought in under the cover of night. Cracovians will be surprised in the morning.” Screenshots show that her post was shared at least 2,100 times before being deleted.

Many other social media accounts, often anonymous right-wing profiles, also posted the video. One such post on X, which claimed the film shows “immigrants being brought to Polish cities” as part of a “hostile takeover”, has been viewed 800,000 times and shared almost 3,000 times.

However, the video in question was in fact originally posted by local activists from Kraków who campaign against overtourism in the city. They said that it showed a group of over 100 people going to a hotel at night.

Krupka’s post was quickly condemned by the local authorities in Kraków, with the mayor, Miszalski, writing to the MP calling on her to apologise for “spreading lies and manipulation in the public space”.

He said that the film “shows a group of tourists walking down one of our streets” but “for political and cynical reasons, she [Krupka] called them immigrants, and accused us of accepting them in Krakow ‘under the cover of night’.”

After Krupka refused to apologise, Miszalski – who is a member of Poland’s main ruling party, the centrist Civic Platform (PO) – sent a request to the speaker of the Sejm, the lower house of parliament in which Krupka sits, for the PiS MP to be brought before the Parliamentary Ethics Committee.

“Thousands of people saw this manipulation that harms the image of Kraków,” said Miszalski, adding that, as mayor, he is obliged to “protect Kraków’s good name”.

“I believe that deleting the post from the MP’s social media is not a sufficient action, and every case of antagonising citizens in such a calculated and false manner requires a reaction – especially in the case of parliamentarians,” wrote Miszalski in his letter to the parliamentary speaker.

“Combating disinformation aimed at sowing hatred and fear is one of the key methods of protecting democratic values,” he added. “I am convinced that parliamentary responsibility requires taking consequences for actions calculated to cause panic among citizens.”

Asked about the issue by reports from broadcaster TVN and news website Onet, Krupka told them that it was “not true” that she herself had shared the video. Instead, she said that it had been posted by the person who administers her account.

“When I realised what she had posted, I told her to delete it. That’s the end of this story,” said the MP, who then refused to answer questions about whether the employee would face any consequences for sharing disinformation on Krupka’s official account. She also refused again to apologise.

PiS has in recent months regularly accused the government and local authorities controlled by the ruling coalition of acquiescing to European – and especially German – demands to settle immigrants in Poland.

However, experts note that many such claims are false or misleading. The actions that PiS has criticised in particular – Germany returning migrants and asylum seekers who have illegally entered from Poland – have been happening legally for years, including when PiS was in power.

Indeed, the number of asylum seekers returned by Germany to Poland under the EU’s Dublin Regulation was higher in 2023, when PiS was in office, than in 2024, when the current governing coalition was in power.

Meanwhile, politicians from PiS have also protested against the establishment of EU-funded integration centres for immigrants in Poland. However, those centres were first established and piloted when PiS was in power, though they are now being rapidly expanded.

Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Main image credit: Zabytkowe Centrum/Facebook (screenshot)

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.