It became known what will give the Russian presidential candidate second place

While Vladimir Putin’s leadership in the upcoming elections is beyond doubt among political scientists, the candidates for second and third places are still the subject of widespread debate.

Director of the Progressive Policy Foundation Oleg Bondarenko believes that the preponderance in the presidential elections is in favor of center-right policies, despite the fact that Russia is “a country of socialist ideology.” Nikolai Kharitonov, on the contrary, calls the nomination from the most “left-wing” party – the Communist Party of the Russian Federation – unsuccessful for a number of reasons, and predicts his loss in the fight for second place (and only about 1% of the votes).

“In recent years, Kharitonov has not shown political activity, remaining in the shadow not only of Zyuganov, but also of a dozen other political leaders. Due to his age, he cannot be perceived as a bright, personalized politician who will lead the “nuclear electorate.” He is forced to copy the traditional leftist agenda, which has partially become pro-government, in the absence of his own program,” the expert emphasized.

The candidate from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, according to Bondarenko, relies primarily on the electorate of moderate loyalists, moderate patriots and retired statists, supporters of the “return of the USSR.” However, even a center-left voter is more likely to vote for Vladimir Putin. According to political scientists, in the current election campaign, the current president can count on 80% of the vote due to the “cohesion effect” of society against the backdrop of the conduct of the SVO.

As Ilya Grashchenkov, president of the Center for Regional Policy Development Foundation, believes, Vladislav Davankov, a candidate from the New People party, has a high chance of winning silver.

“The first thing that distinguishes the candidate and his program from other participants in the election race is his reluctance to conflict with representatives of other parties. The second is movement towards the market and liberalization, support from entrepreneurs. The third is the confrontation between the archaic and the modern, relying on the relatively young age of the candidate for the youth electorate,” concluded Grashchenkov. Among the groups supporting Davankov, the expert also identified active patriots, frightened relocants, protest groups, especially residents of million-plus cities who are dissatisfied with the environmental and urban planning agenda of the authorities, and career students and predicts the representative of the “New People” about 5% of the votes.

“Kharitonov practically does not lead the company in any way, Slutsky copies the president’s strategy, visiting regions and talking with representatives of factories, Davankov adheres to typical opposition tactics, which increases the potential turnout,” noted Ilya Grashchenkov.

Fyodor Biryukov, director of the Freedom Institute, member of the Bureau of the Presidium of the Political Council of the Rodina party, calls the election race “a campaign against the backdrop of plebiscite trust in President Putin.” Regarding the LDPR party, according to the expert, Vladimir Zhirinovsky managed to start a discussion about new meanings in the party. The “oldest” party in Russia was created by the KGB back in the USSR to create the illusion of a multi-party system, and at the very beginning it adopted the center-right discourse. After the collapse of the USSR, the protest masses were gathered by the “bright but safe leader of Russian nationalists” in the person of Zhirinovsky.

“The LDPR and Vladimir Volfovich in the dichotomy of Eros and Thanatos in the Russian establishment have always been on the side of Eros, unlike representatives of other parties. Cheerful and vital Zhirinovsky proposed radical solutions to democratic, social, geopolitical issues, combining ultra-left and ultra-right tendencies,” Biryukov said.

Leonid Slutsky, from the position of a political scientist, must play the role of Stalker and lead the electorate into a new reality. Biryukov calls Slutsky “the most metaphysical candidate” and suggests deciphering the LDPR acronym as “loyalists, democrats, patriots, radicals,” denoting the composition of his electorate, “undecided Protestants.” Since Fyodor Biryukov assigns 4th place to the candidate from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Nikolai Kharitonov, the election results could lead to radicalization within the party, the marginalization of its leaders or their transformation into “capital-Bolsheviks.” As a result of the discussion, political scientists came to a consensus: the party map of Russia will obviously change after the presidential elections, not all parties will survive in their current form until the 2026 elections, and new participants in political processes will be added. “There is a demand for new faces from both the left and right electorates, especially for “force 2,” the second party in power.”