WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Polish democracy champion and former President Lech Walesa says a victory for Republican Donald Trump in this year’s U.S. presidential election would bring “bad luck” to the world.
Walesa said in a short post on Facebook on Sunday that he does not interfere in the internal affairs of other countries, but that the matter is “too important to the world” to withhold his opinion.
“I am confident that Americans will vote responsibly. In my opinion, I am fully convinced that the election of Trump would be a misfortune for the US and the world,” he wrote in all caps.
He didn’t explain his thoughts further.
Walesa, 81, played a historic role as the leader of Solidarity, a union that advocated for workers’ rights and greater freedoms in the 1980s, when Poland was still under Soviet-backed communist rule.
He won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1983 for his defense of workers’ rights and universal freedoms more broadly. Solidarity ultimately played a crucial role in the peaceful collapse of communism.
Walesa subsequently served one term as President of Poland.