Election update IX. Russia begins preparations for Unified Voting Day 2024

In its regular Electoral Bulletin, a digest with news about Russian elections (all issues in Russian are available here), the Movement in Defense of Voter’s Rights ’Golos’ discusses the preparations of authorities for the regional elections 2024.

In September, elections will be held for 13 regional legislatures, including the so-called 'new territories', i.e. the occupied Crimea and Sevastopol, as well as for 22 governors, including the head of St. Petersburg.

The Kremlin is actively preparing for the elections by further restricting both the citizens’s voting rights and political competition in regions that are problematic for the Kremlin.

In this review, REM briefly summarizes the most significant electoral events of May-June 2024.

1. "Foreign agents" and "extremists" were deprived of almost all voting rights

In May, amendments to the electoral legislation came into effect, significantly infringing upon the already limited voting rights of citizens. The attack on the ability of the most opposition-minded Russian citizens to participate in elections continued - those whom the authorities label as "foreign agents" and "extremists". The Ministry of Justice assigns these statuses very easily, virtually without gathering evidence, and they are practically impossible to contest. Currently, there are more than 400 individuals on the "foreign agents" registry. Many of them live abroad, but a significant part remain in Russia.

"Foreign agents" and "extremists" are now banned from being candidates, members of commissions, observers, authorized or designated persons, or financial supporters of candidates - that is, from participating in the election campaign in any capacity, or even simply observing it, which effectively means the deprivation of voting rights. Already elected deputies with the status of "foreign agents" have already started to be stripped of their mandates (read more about "foreign agents" legislation in our recent article).

Assigning the status of a "foreign agent" can become a simple and effective way to remove from elections any individuals who are inconvenient for the authorities. The Kremlin has already tried this simple method: in June 2024, anti-war candidate for the Russian presidency Yekaterina Duntsova, politician and human rights activist Marina Litvinovich, and even Maria Andreeva, one of the leaders of the "Way Home" movement of the wives of the mobilized, were declared foreign agents.

There is no doubt that this addition to the list of "foreign agents" is directly related to the elections: Litvinovich was planning to run for the Moscow City Duma, Duntsova announced the creation of a coalition to participate in the capital's elections right before having been declared a "foreign agent," and the movement of wives and mothers of the mobilized has become increasingly politicized in recent months and could well become one of the strong participants in the elections.

2. The number of regions to hold gubernatorial elections in September has increased. Instead of 16 regions, there are now 22

After the inauguration of the head of state, a new government and Presidential Administration were formed. Five current governors moved to work in federal government bodies - from Khabarovsk Krai, Kaliningrad, Kemerovo, Kursk, and Tula Regions. Now, all of these regions will hold their respective elections in September.

The situation will be most challenging in Khabarovsk Krai, where voters will elect the head of the region, deputies of the regional parliament and the largest municipalities, including the regional capital, at the same time. Tula region will also face simultaneous elections of the head of the region and deputies of the regional and city parliaments.

Additionally, Putin "approved" the resignation of the governor of the Altai Republic. Elections for the head of the region will also be held on Unified Voting Day 2024 at the same time with elections to the regional parliament. Putin appointed Andrey Turchak, former Secretary of the General Council of United Russia and Deputy Speaker of the Senate, as the acting governor of the Altai Republic. Instead of these high-ranking positions, he became a deputy governor in a thinly populated and poor Altai Republic: the region only has 160,000 registered voters and an expenditure budget of less than 37 billion rubles (370 million euros), the main sectors of the economy there are agriculture and tourism.

Experts call this appointment a political exile for Turchak. Several reasons are cited for his falling out of favor with the president: from unfortunate reports on the progress of the war in Ukraine to struggles for control over the occupied territories and the conflict with the leadership of the Defense Ministry.

Now, the upcoming election for the head of the Altai Republic will attract significant attention, also because it is a very challenging region for the authorities. Since the return of direct gubernatorial elections, two electoral campaigns have taken place in the region. In both cases, the regional authorities failed to block their main competitors from collecting the "municipal filter" - an extremely rare case for gubernatorial elections in Russia. In 2014, the then head of the region was saved from a second round by just 500 votes. In 2019, the result for the pro-government provisional governor was also not the highest - less than 59%. How the "municipal filter" will be collected and whether the current provisional head of the republic will have strong competitors is one of the main intrigues of the upcoming elections. However, the pressure on the "systemic opposition" is increasing. Thus, it became known that the CPRF hastily replaced its already approved candidate for governor, Viktor Romashkin (who won more than 30% in the last election), with a little-known member of the regional parliament.

3. Municipal reform is accelerating in the regions. It could affect 90% of elected positions in Russia

After the presidential election, the municipal reform, previously frozen due to its unpopularity, has been reactivated. It entails the elimination of the lowest and most numerous level of local self-government. As a result, tens of thousands of deputies and heads of small municipalities - villages, settlements, and small towns - will lose their mandates. The process of dismantling most municipalities began almost simultaneously in several regions at once - in Vladimir, Ryazan, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Chelyabinsk, and Yaroslavl regions.

The formal reason for the reform is the need to increase the efficiency of municipalities. But this talk hides other motives: in many regions, there is municipal opposition to the regional authorities controlled by the Kremlin. In addition, the lack of funds in municipalities is so great that it spoils official statistics. The result will be a reduction in people's ability to influence problem-solving even in their small villages - the scope of grassroots democracy will shrink dramatically.

4. The CEC approved the list of territories for online voting to be used in September. These territories are home to 19 million voters

The Central Election Commission has published a list of regions where online voting will be available in September. 11 territories will be entirely covered by it, while in another 15 territories, it will be used for specific elections.

REV will be used across the territory in the Altai and Mari El republics, Vologda, Kaliningrad, Kursk, Lipetsk, Murmansk and Chelyabinsk regions, occupied Sevastopol and Moscow, as well as the Nenets Autonomous Okrug. In specific elections, online voting will be available in Karelia, Komi, Chechnya, Chuvashia, Altai Krai, Kamchatka Krai, and Perm Krai, Arkhangelsk, Kostroma, Moscow, Pskov, Sverdlovsk, Smolensk, Tomsk and Yaroslavl regions.

On June 19, there was a rumor about the complete replacement of paper voting with electronic voting in the upcoming elections in Moscow this fall. This was reported by the Moskvybory channel with reference to the CEC broadcast. However, the CEC quickly refuted these rumors, explaining that unfortunate wording was to blame - the Moscow City Election Commission had requested permission from the CEC to conduct electronic voting for the Moscow City Duma, alongside traditional paper voting, and received approval. According to the CEC, there will still be paper ballots in the fall elections in Moscow.

Experts have repeatedly emphasized that online voting seriously violates basic guarantees of electoral rights: it can be easily falsified, is virtually uncontrollable for the public, and can lead to voter coercion.