How did the Moscow mayoral elections end?

Sergei Sobyanin (United Russia) wins his third election as Moscow mayor by a landslide. The counting of protocols from traditional polling stations has not yet been completed, but the Central Election Commission (CEC) of the Russian Federation announced Sobyanin’s victory after the results of remote electronic voting (DEG) were published. As soon as the first results of remote electronic voting appeared, Sobyanin was congratulated on his victory by the deputy head of the Central Election Commission, Nikolai Bulaev.

According to data as of 21:00 Moscow time, Sobyanin received 2,053,954 votes (76.84%), the second place was taken by the candidate from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Leonid Zyuganov with a result of 212,153 votes (8.01%), the representative of the LDPR was in third place Boris Chernyshov with 159,313 votes (5.89%), in fourth place is the candidate from “New People” Vladislav Davankov with 136,573 votes (5.19%) and the last place was taken by the Right Russia Dmitry Gusev, with 103,762 votes (3.91% ).

“The preliminary results of voting in the Moscow mayoral elections have been summed up,” Sobyanin wrote on his blog at night, thanking Muscovites for their support. “I will do everything to make our city even cooler and more beautiful. Ahead of the entire planet,” he said. In general, the breakdown of votes received by candidates did not change by the morning: Sobyanin received 76.38% of the votes in the election of the mayor of the capital after processing 99.77% of the protocols. The mayor’s results are even more convincing than in 2018.

After processing 100% of the protocols, the current mayor of Moscow, Sergei Sobyanin, wins the election with 76.39% of the votes. This is evidenced by data from the Russian Central Election Commission.

In Moscow, in the mayoral elections, turnout, according to preliminary data, was a record for the capital and this voting level of 42.5%. In 2018, turnout in mayoral elections was 30.9%, in 2013 – 32.03%. In 2003, the turnout was higher (57.5%), but State Duma deputies were also elected at the same time.

In Moscow, the DEG (used for the first time in mayoral elections) takes place on its own platform, separate from the federal one, and does not require prior registration, only a verified account on the mos.ru website. Of the nearly 3.3 million voters, over 2.7 million participated via remote electronic voting (that is, more than 82%), said the head of the Moscow City Election Commission, Olga Kirillova.

Alexei Melnikov, executive secretary of the Public Monitoring Commission of the city of Moscow, said that with a 100% turnout, 78.84% of those in the pre-trial detention center voted for the current mayor. Further places were distributed similarly to the DEG: Zyuganov (6.22%), Chernyshov (4.2%), Davankov (3.04%), Gusev (2.7%).

All three days of voting in the capital’s mayoral elections, according to a statement by the Public Headquarters for Observing the Elections in Moscow in 2023, passed without violations. At the same time, on the first day of voting, September 8, in the morning, voters complained about glitches in the system, due to which they could not use the DEG. Chairman of the public headquarters Vadim Kovalev noted on the first day: “This morning there was a delay in online voting, we found a weak point – this is the SMS sending service [с кодом подтверждения]. <…> Any, even perfect network [в новогоднюю ночь] hangs up, and only when a flurry of congratulations passes, you can get through – something similar happened here. Indeed, it took quite a long time for us to receive many SMS messages.”

Voting at the polling stations, according to him, took place regularly and without violations. “We responded to some individual situations, there were about 15-20 cases, when we called our observers at the PEC,” Kovalev added. On the second day, “there were no violations that could have affected the election process,” Kovalev explained to reporters.

At the same time, voters in a number of Moscow districts complained about the refusal to issue paper ballots to voters. Several such complaints were recorded by observers from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, a party representative confirmed to Vedomosti.

The DEG was popularized not only by Sobyanin, but also by President Vladimir Putin: they both voted remotely. Many members of the government also voted in the DEG.

The mayoral candidates voted in the traditional way – except for the mayor himself. Zyuganov came on September 10 to the Cherry Orchard ITC. He emphasized that the elections are being held with few violations. Chernyshov voted on September 8 at the polling station in Maly Kislovsky Lane. Gusev is in the Vnukovskoye settlement. Davankov was the only one who voted using the electronic voting terminal (TEG) on September 8.

The high turnout in the Moscow mayoral elections was achieved precisely thanks to the DEG, says Ilya Grashchenkov, president of the Center for Regional Policy Development. The current mayor of Moscow was able to reach the interests of all segments of the population, but other candidates were also able to attract voters to the DEG: for example, Davankov mobilized “the remaining part of the non-relocated liberal electorate,” and Chernyshov brought “Russian nationalists” to the elections. In addition, the high turnout at the DEG in Moscow is also due to “material factors and convenience”: encouraging electronic voting makes it possible to legally earn money as part of the “Million Prizes” program, says political scientist Alexander Nemtsev.

One of the most noteworthy news from the EDC may be Gusev’s “modest” results, which are “a reflection of the general campaign of the Right Russians,” Mikhail Vinogradov, president of the St. Petersburg Politics Foundation, told Vedomosti. Regarding Zyuganov’s potential second place, he noted that this was expected, “since the Communist Party of the Russian Federation has always been the party in large cities that people vote for in order to hurt the authorities.”

Second place for Zyuganov can help him claim leadership of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, and the last place for Gusev is not fraught with anything for him: the Right Russia party is now in general in a systemic crisis, Grashchenkov added. Nemtsev added that in the case of Zyuganov, “it was not he himself who won, but his last name” (Leonid is the grandson of the leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Gennady Zyuganov). According to the expert, Zyuganov may declare that he is the main opposition candidate in the capital in order to take control of the Moscow branch of the party and subsequently claim a greater party position. However, his position here is already strong.

In the last mayoral election in 2018, Sergei Sobyanin received 70.17% of the votes. In second place was Vadim Kumin (Communist Party of the Russian Federation) – 11.38%, then Ilya Sviridov (A Just Russia) – 7.01%, State Duma deputy from the LDPR Mikhail Degtyarev – 6.72%, and the ex-owner SU-155 Mikhail Balakin (“Union of Citizens”) – 1.87%.