Prosecutors allege that Grzegorz Braun denied Nazi Germany's genocidal killings in gas chambers. The European Parliament has voted to waive the parliamentary immunity of far-right Polish MEP Grzegorz Braun in a fresh Holocaust-denial case, just weeks after prosecutors in Poland charged him over separate remarks denying Nazi crimes. The vote on Tuesday followed a recommendation issued last week by Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs, known as JURI, to waive Braun’s immunity. The case concerns statements Braun made during a public debate in Warsaw in September 2025 that was streamed online. According to a request submitted by Poland’s prosecutor general, Braun allegedly denied that Nazi Germany carried out genocidal killings in gas chambers at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camp in occupied Poland and Majdanek on the outskirts of Lublin in eastern Poland. The request was submitted to the European Parliament in February. Waiving Braun’s immunity does not amount to a finding of guilt, but allows Polish authorities to pursue criminal proceedings over the remarks. Holocaust denial is particularly sensitive in Poland, where Nazi Germany established its largest concentration and extermination camps during its occupation of the country and murdered millions of Jews, Poles and other victims. Publicly denying Nazi crimes, including genocide, is punishable in Poland by a fine or up to three years in prison. Provocative figure Braun, leader of the ultra-nationalist Confederation of the Polish Crown party, is a controversial figure known for anti-EU, nationalist and antisemitic rhetoric. He is already facing prosecution over separate Holocaust-denial remarks made in July 2025 during interviews with private radio station Radio Wnet and on YouTube. In one of the interviews, Braun said: “Auschwitz with gas chambers is, unfortunately, a fake.” The European Parliament waived his immunity in that case in March, allowing prosecutors from Poland’s state-run Institute of National Remembrance, which investigates Nazi and Communist crimes, to charge him in August with two counts of publicly denying Nazi genocide. Under European Parliament rules, immunity is waived in relation to specific alleged offenses, meaning a new request is required for separate offenses. He is also involved in other legal proceedings, including one concerning his use of a fire extinguisher to put out Hanukkah candles in the Polish parliament in December 2023. Other cases concern the alleged unlawful detention of a female gynaecologist, the destruction of an LGBT+ exhibition, and the removal of Ukrainian and EU flags. Braun has served in the European Parliament since 2024. He finished fourth in Poland’s 2025 presidential election, in what was viewed as a surprisingly strong result for the divisive far-right candidate.
