Paul Goble
Staunton, Sept. 21 – There have been so many stories about the 2026 Duma elections in Russia that it is hard to know where to begin in talking about them. Most are repetitive, but a few contain new information. In its review, the Horizontal Russia portal offers a way forward and suggests that there are seven things that the just-completed vote will be remembered for.
According to the portal, which is devoted primarily to developments beyond the ring road circling Moscow, despite all the noise, there are only a few things most Russians will remember about this vote, most of which are just continuation of trends that began earlier in the Putin years (semnasem.org/articles/2026/09/21/nichego-novogo).
It singles out seven in particular:
· First, “the Central Election Commmission declared open war on observers,” limiting their access more than ever before and thus hiding what officials were doing from the public.
· Second, the real war was for finding ways to boost reported participation because the share of Russians who voted was smaller than the Kremlin wanted.
· Third, competition among parties and candidates “fell by several orders of magnitude” as the government excluded candidates by one means or another to ensure that anyone who really wanted to protest would have no one to choose.
· Fourth, places of employment, private as well as governmental, “became mobilization points” with bosses telling their workers whom they expected the latter to vote for.
· Fifth, “voters found themselves in an online ghetto,” with nearly a third forced to vote electronically and thus opening the way for still more falsification.
· Sixth, the election machinery was so poorly organized in so many places that ballots weren’t available and whole areas weren’t able to vote at all.
· And seventh, protests shifted from active steps to “symbolic” ones like putting apples on the tables of election officials.
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