President Andrzej Duda and his wife are visiting the United States. In Doylestown, Pennsylvania, known as the “American Częstochowa,” he appealed to Poles to vote in the American elections. “Do everything to ensure that the Polish community in the United States is an absolutely non-negligible community,” he appealed.
The Polish presidential couple visited the National Shrine of Our Lady of Częstochowa in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, on Sunday – they took part in mass and then in the ceremony of unveiling a monument in tribute to the founders of “Solidarity”.
The sanctuary run by the Pauline Fathers – called the “American Częstochowa” – is an important place for the Polish diaspora, where a copy of the painting from Jasna Góra is located.
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President Duda emphasized that a strong America is important for Europe, and especially for Poland, and a strong Poland is important for America. – A Poland that truly constitutes a guarantee of security in its region. A Poland that is strong in its spirit, but also in its military and infrastructural strength – said Duda.
A strong Poland, he pointed out, is one that will provide the American army with adequate resources and support to show “who is the greatest power in the world and who decides about world peace and tranquility.”
“I ask you to go to the American elections”
– In order for America to fulfill this extremely important role, it must have the strength to stop any opponent. And for Poland to have its guarantee in this strength, your vote is needed. That is why I ask you to go to the American elections – not only the upcoming presidential elections, but every election. So that this strength of the current Polish community in America also testifies to the strength of the homeland and the strength of Polish speeches in the United States – appealed President Duda.
As he added, “political pragmatism is simple”. – If there are hundreds of thousands, millions of votes, then this community counts and its issues count. If there are no votes, then this community is negligible. Do everything to make the Polish community, Poles in the USA, an absolutely non-negligible community. Let this monument serve this purpose, let this memory serve this purpose, let your feeling that you are carrying the fate of the Republic of Poland with us in your hands serve this purpose – said the president, addressing the Poles gathered in Doylestown. Andrzej Duda.
He emphasized that Poles living in the United States, although they live “far across the ocean”, “carry in their hands the fate of the Republic of Poland”. – Your voice, in the broad sense of the word, including the voice in the matter of Poland, matters, it has great significance for our security, for our freedom, for our survival here, where we are and as we are – said the president.
Macierewicz spoke about “locking up heroic priests”
The speeches during the ceremony included political themes and sharp criticism of the authorities in Poland. The event's organizer, the president of the Katyn-Smolensk Committee, Tadeusz Antoniak, suggested, among other things, that democracy is once again under threat in Poland. “When we started building this monument, we did not know that in a moment, now, at this moment, democracy would be under threat in Poland, that something like a fighting democracy would appear, that the president's veto would not be respected. It turns out that this monument will once again be a warning to those who are trying to destroy the law,” said a Polish activist.
The president of the Institute of National Remembrance, speaking after the president Karol Nawrocki he warned that in Poland “we still have to fight communist propaganda, which unfortunately returns to the Polish government and the core curriculum”.
The closing ceremony was closed by former Minister of National Defense Antoni Macierewicz, who gave the president a copy of a 20-minute film on the results of the work of the Smolensk subcommittee he headed, accusing the current government of “destroying families and destroying the Church” and “locking up heroic priests.” He also claimed that the “Smolensk murder” was “the source of Mr. Donald Tusk and his apparatus defending Putin,” comparing the challenge of finding the truth about the Katyn crime to that of the one.
Banners and Trump hats in the crowd
Several hundred Poles and Americans of Polish descent living in the US, mostly from New Jersey and New York, arrived for the ceremony at the American Częstochowa on Sunday. Some of them brought campaign hats and banners to the ceremony. Donald Trump.
The Republican candidate's campaign initially announced that Donald Trump would join Andrzej Duda at the ceremony, but then it was announced that the meeting would not take place.
Main image source: PAP/Leszek Szymanski