Parliamentary parties reported on the past elections

Representatives of parliamentary parties summed up the results of the single voting day in 2023. “United Russia” reported “victory at all levels”, the communists were dissatisfied with the victorious slogans of the party in power, the LDPR considers itself “the second political force in the country”, the Right Russians are convinced that the party tried to “ eliminate” external forces from the political arena, and “New People” raised the issue of returning one-day voting.

United Russia was able to improve its results relative to 2018: how calculated Vedomosti reported that almost a million more voters voted for the party. Secretary of the General Council of United Russia Andrei Turchak announced that United Russia is the only one who nominated candidates at all levels of elections, and its closest competitors are more than three times behind in the number of candidates. He explained the failures of his opponents precisely by this. “Colleagues, you need to take part in the election campaign, nominate the maximum number of candidates and not limit yourself to elections at the regional and city levels, go to local government, earn votes there and win the trust of voters in order to get the result that United Russia received in this electoral cycle,” the United Russia member was pleased.

Speaking about the gubernatorial elections, Turchak noted the candidates from United Russia in the Kemerovo (Sergey Tsivilev), Pskov (Mikhail Vedernikov) and Smolensk (Vasily Anokhin) regions, who received more than 85% of the votes. All the by-elections to the State Duma, which were held in four districts, were also won by United Russia. The highest support in the elections to the legislative assembly of the party was provided by residents of the Zaporozhye region with a result of 83%. In all four new regions, 2.7 million voters voted for representatives of United Russia (in addition to the 4.7 million votes received in the rest of Russia). “This speaks of trust in the election system itself, in the president’s party and the fact that people have been waiting for a long time to return to their native harbor,” he believes.

In addition, Turchak spoke about the work done on bugs. In the Khabarovsk Territory, the party has, as he put it, a “difficult electoral history”: in 2018, the party candidate Vyacheslav Shport lost the election in the second round to the LDPR candidate Sergei Furgal. A year later, the LDPR received 30 seats in the Legislative Assembly, and United Russia received two. In 2020, Furgal was deprived of his powers due to a criminal case for organizing a murder. Turchak said the party had completely “rebooted its work,” which made it possible to “regain the trust of voters”: the current mayor of this region, Sergei Kravchuk, received 45% of the vote.

Parliamentary elections in the Arkhangelsk and Smolensk regions were traditionally difficult for the party in power, where United Russia took second place in 2018. In this cycle, United Russia members carried out “party mobilization,” which allowed them to take revenge: 21 out of 24 mandates in the districts of the Arkhangelsk region, in the Smolensk region – 29 out of 33 mandates. Despite the fact that in Khakassia the United Russia candidate Sergei Sokol withdrew from the election race for health reasons, United Russia managed to take 23 out of 25 single-mandate constituencies, which will allow the qualified majority faction at the level of the Supreme Council to “make any decisions in the region, not only personnel, <...> but also economic and financial-economic,” Turchak said. Regarding the future presidential elections in March 2024, he noted that United Russia plans to bring 30 million votes “to the overall result.”

Deputy Secretary of the General Council of United Russia Sergei Perminov noted, in particular, the campaign in Yekaterinburg, which was led on behalf of the party by Evgeny Kuyvashev. In a region that was previously “a liberal capital with constant disputes about identities, about some centers, embankments,” United Russia was able to win a majority of votes from a “very demanding audience” and formed a faction capable of making qualified decisions. It is worth noting that factions in the Yekaterinburg City Duma will be formed not only by parliamentary parties, but also by Yabloko.

The head of the New People faction, Alexey Nechaev, reported the main news for the party in these elections: despite the new era of special operations and sanctions, “the topic of development and renewal has not lost its relevance,” he believes. This, according to Nechaev, is confirmed by the victory of party lists in eight legislative assemblies of regional parliaments. Last year, for example, New People won only one region. He also shared that there are four regions in which, according to sociological data, the party could have won, but ultimately suffered defeat: “For us, this will be a lesson that observers need to close all polling stations, not allowing anything to happen.” uncontrollable,” summed up the head of “New People.”

Separately, Nechaev singled out Vladislav Davankov’s Moscow campaign for mayor, during which the party collected people’s wishes and compiled a “mayor’s handbook.” “I’m sure that Sergei Sobyanin is at least half [предложений] will bring it to life, but if it doesn’t, then in five years we will already be our mayor,” Nechaev is sure. He also spoke about the three-day voting: since this format was introduced due to the coronavirus pandemic, you can already try to “limit yourself to one day.” The ex-mayor of Yakutsk, State Duma deputy Sardana Avksentyeva joined the briefing via video link. She said that as a result of the elections in Yakutia, for the first time, a party faction would be formed in the state assembly: five people entered on party lists and one won in a single-mandate district. For the first time, party members in the regions overtook the Communist Party of the Russian Federation and took second place. Also, “New People” will receive mandates in all eight district councils, Avksentieva added.

LDPR leader Leonid Slutsky assessed the campaign positively: “Simply great!” According to him, political scientists call the results of the LDPR “the main sensation of the season.” Slutsky did not contradict this statement and added that “we are actively moving towards becoming the main opposition party and the second political force in the country.” In seven regions, the LDPR took second place, including the Lugansk and Zaporozhye republics.

The gap from competitors in other regions, according to Slutsky, is completely reduced to “a statistical error.” This is the second election in which the party entered without its former leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky, in connection with which Slutsky noted that after the death of the head of the LDPR, the party not only did not disintegrate, but also became, in his opinion, “the stem party in the political architecture of Russia.” At the same time, the party leader shared that the LDPR expected a higher turnout taking into account the three-day voting. He called the campaign in Kalmykia the main failure of this electoral cycle: there party deputies failed to overcome the 5% barrier. Slutsky was pleased with Boris Chernyshov’s Moscow campaign, noting that he conducted it “with sparkle.” Speaking about future plans, Slutsky added that in 2024 the party will mainly use “angry citizens” and “progressive youth.”

“We attached an extremely special attitude to these elections,” said the leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Gennady Zyuganov. This is explained by a number of reasons: firstly, “the systemic crisis that the entire planet is currently experiencing,” and secondly, “the war that was declared on the Russian world” against the backdrop of the upcoming presidential elections, he explained.

The head of the communists was dissatisfied not only with Western opponents from outside, but also with United Russia: “Unfortunately, [партия власти] sharply worsened the conditions for holding normal and full-fledged democratic elections.” He also added that the slogans of the ruling party that “we won everywhere” are tactless and illegal from a legal point of view, since, in his opinion, a party that has not solved many problems cannot win. As for the immediate course of the campaigns, the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, according to him, placed the greatest emphasis on the regions headed by representatives of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation: for example, the Oryol region led by Andrei Klychkov (who received more than 80% of the votes), who was about 10 times at the front, and on the Republic of Khakassia, where the communist candidate Valentin Konovalov won “against the wishes of the authorities.”

Zyuganov also spoke about the “galaxy of young politicians” who showed themselves worthy during this electoral cycle. Among these he included the first deputy chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Yuri Afonin, the deputy chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Dmitry Novikov, member of the presidium of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Leonid Kalashnikov, the mayor of Novosibirsk Anatoly Loktya, Klychkov, Konovalov. The name of the grandson of the leader of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Leonid Zyuganov, a deputy of the Moscow City Duma and a candidate for mayor who took second place, was not mentioned among them.

The head of the party and Duma faction “A Just Russia – For Truth” Sergei Mironov said that “based on the results of the Unified Democratic Party [можно сказать]”that an unprecedented attempt was made to completely eliminate the party from the political arena.” The fact is, according to Mironov, that it is their party that opposes officials and “defeatists on the ground who sleep and see that the special military operation ends and ends in defeat,” and the Right Russiaers are not happy with this, he concluded.

The opponents of the patriotic bloc still managed to harm them, and therefore the party leadership is dissatisfied with the course of the elections, but recognizes them, “despite the failures in seven regions,” where party representatives did not even overcome the five percent threshold. For this, the heads of regional departments are threatened with removal from their positions, and some have already voluntarily submitted applications for dismissal, Mironov added. Speaking directly about the course of the election campaign, he recalled the unacceptable situation in the Yaroslavl region, where ill-wishers published a newspaper similar to the party one, with an attempt “on the sacred, on the special operation and the soldiers”: on its pages, allegedly, Mironov and the co-chairman of the A Just Russia party, Zakhar Prilepin called for general mobilization.