Russia has Its Own Form of Gerrymandering with Moscow Redrawing Electoral Districts to Weaken Urban Voters Inclined to Support Opposition, ‘Horizontal Russia’ Says

Paul Goble

    Staunton, Apr. 23 – Moscow has now drawn new electoral districts for the 2026 Duma vote, a process that is required by law to take place every ten years to ensure that these districts remain roughly equal in size. But in fact, experts with whom Horizontal Russia spoke say, the lines have been drawn to weaken urban voters who are less likely to support the party of power.

    Each electoral district has approximately 500,000 residents, but there are a variety of ways that officials can draw the lines to achieve that. One step they have taken this time more than in the past is to combine portions of urban centers with larger rural ones to boost the chances United Russia will win (semnasem.org/articles/2025/04/23/rossijskaya-vlast-25-let-ubivala-izbiratelnyj-process-pochemu-ona-vse-eshe-boitsya-vyborov).

    This has happened, Russian political scientist Dmitry Loboyko says, because the Kremlin knows that rural voters are reliably in the corner of the party of power while urban ones are more likely to vote for opposition parties and reduce the chances that the elections will turn out as the Putin regime wants.

    To be sure, Loboyko and other experts say, this redrawing of electoral district boundaries is only one of the many ways the Kremlin manipulates elections and ensures that its candidates win. Using spoilers and outright falsification are likely more important. But Russian gerrymandering matters and should be factored into any analysis of what is going on.