Over the course of Sept. 8-10, Russia held local elections across the country. This included regional, municipal, and gubernatorial elections, and was the first time that the new Russian territories of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as of Kherson and Zaporozhye participated.
The turnout was claimed to have been the highest since 2017, and was especially high in the new territories. In all cases Putin’s United Russia Party won by wide margins, including the mayoral race in Moscow which was won by Sergei Sobyanin, a close Putin ally, with over 75% of the vote. Moscow is considered to have the largest amount of opposition-leaning voters in the country.
On Sept. 28, President Putin held a meeting with many of the newly elected officials, congratulating them and laying out the tasks before the country. He called the elections “a momentous event, a crucial step in the new regions’ integration into the single legal and administrative space of our vast country.” He also said that, given the high turnout and large support for his party, that the results “are very convincing.”
