Increasingly, Europe’s centrist figureheads are dropping their once-high-minded rhetoric on irregular migration, reaching instead for positions that were previously the preserve of the continent’s populist rabble-rousers. In Poland, like in much of Europe, “voters across the board expect that border security and migration controls are the priority,” Kucharczyk said. But Thursday’s victory for Tusk in Brussels underscores a broader, rightward shift across Europe on the issue of irregular migration. “It’s an existential issue for this coalition, and they don’t want to take chances on issues like migration,” Kucharczyk said. The wider question is whether the longstanding principles of the border-free Schengen Area can survive an enduring era of rising migration and populist subversion.

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Persons: Donald Tusk, ” Tusk, Spain’s Pedro Sanchez –, Tusk, ” Jacek Kucharczyk, Emmanuel Macron, Germany’s, Olaf Scholz, ” Kucharczyk, ”, Adnan Beci, Ursula von der Leyen, Chancellor Scholz, Keir Starmer –, –, Scholz, Thomas Niedermueller, Italy’s, Giorgia Meloni, “, Marta Welander, PiS, Poland’s, Kucharczyk Organizations: CNN, European Union Council, of Public Affairs, Wednesday, Getty, European Commission, EU, Committee, Law and Justice, SPD, ISIS, – Locations: Brussels, Poland, EU, Belarus, Europe, Russia, Albania, Warsaw, AFP, EU’s, France, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Solingen, Hungary, Slovakia