Report on social media monitoring for the eleventh week (25–31 August) of the election campaign for the State Duma of the Russian Federation of the ninth convocation, scheduled for 20 September 2026
The Elections Atlas project continues its programme of weekly social media monitoring during the State Duma election campaign. We are tracking the activity of election participants in the online space.
The results of the social media monitoring are published weekly.
The Yabloko party list has been finally removed from the election, so the party is no longer counted in the monitoring (although we continue to track it and it will occasionally be mentioned for comparison). Over the week from 25 to 31 August, 168,484 mentions of the ten remaining parties were examined. The main topics of the week were the car accident involving LDPR leader Leonid Slutsky, the statement by Rodina leader Alexei Zhuravlev on the need to use tactical nuclear weapons, the ongoing removal of Yabloko regional lists following lawsuits by the LDPR, Rodina and the Communists of Russia, as well as complaints from employees of enterprises and organisations about being coerced into participating in remote electronic voting (REV).
Key findings
In the eleventh week, a noticeable decline in social media users' interest in the election topic is recorded. After the cancellation of Yabloko's registration, the campaign returns to its former, "depressive" state. Despite a 6% increase in the number of publications, total views fell by 13.0% (from 258.86 to 225.09 million), and engagement fell by 32.7% (from 5.72 to 3.85 million). Moreover, even the growth in the number of publications itself is due solely to the fact that A Just Russia has again switched on at full capacity its network of party publics of 1,012 VKontakte pages with a minimal number of subscribers. Without this network, the total volume of publications would have been 30.4% lower than last week's figure (all other indicators would also have declined further).
Even after the cancellation of the federal list's registration, Yabloko remains a noticeable part of the pre-election agenda, outperforming A Just Russia and New People on the main metrics. This is partly linked to the ongoing attempts to remove the party or its candidates in single-member districts or in regional and local elections, and partly to the party's own activity, in particular its fundraising stream on social media.
For the first time, the LDPR has taken first place in views and engagement, but almost all of the growth is linked to the road accident involving the party's leader Leonid Slutsky.
The CPRF showed a decline on all indicators this week, but remained second in engagement thanks to the continued discussion of two of its prominent candidates — Nikolai Bondarenko (removed from the election; his nomination as a presidential candidate in a few years' time is being discussed) and Mikhail Matveyev (his candidacy, on the contrary, was reinstated in the election).
Rodina shows multiple-fold growth this week. This was influenced by the resonant statement by Rodina leader Zhuravlev on the need to use tactical nuclear weapons.
Number of mentions
In the eleventh week of the campaign (25–31 August), 168,484 mentions of the ten parties were recorded — 6% more than a week earlier. The changes by party are in different directions: A Just Russia grew threefold (from 22,645 to 71,768), the Direct Democracy Party — by 80.4% (from 56 to 101), the Party of Pensioners — by 47.6% (from 695 to 1,026), the LDPR — by 53.3% (from 12,797 to 19,611), the Communists of Russia — by 22.0% (from 1,120 to 1,366), Rodina +10.8% (from 2,179 to 2,415), New People — almost unchanged, up 2.6% (from 4,752 to 4,874); at the same time, United Russia fell by 36.1% (from 77,935 to 49,770), the CPRF — by 31.2% (from 24,163 to 16,628) and the Greens — by 65.8% (from 2,702 to 925). Moreover, the Greens' trend radically diverges from what we saw in the television airtime in the same week.
A Just Russia leads in the number of mentions (71,768 mentions, but exclusively due to the activity of the network of party publics). In second place, with a large gap from the remaining parties, is United Russia (49,770), followed by the LDPR (19,611) and the CPRF (16,628). The remaining six parties together produced 8,707 publications — 5.2% of the total volume.
A separate topic of the week is the continuation of the series of decisions to remove Yabloko regional lists. We excluded the party's data from the totals, since it is no longer a participant in the election, but we continue to track it. All the more so because Yabloko is also mentioned in posts linked to other parties, in connection with lawsuits to remove its lists or individual candidates in single-member districts or in regional elections. For example, a court in Yekaterinburg removed Yabloko from the elections to the Legislative Assembly of Sverdlovsk Oblast following a lawsuit by the LDPR.
The Kaliningrad Regional Court granted the lawsuit by the Communists of Russia to remove the party's list.
In Pskov, a court removed Yabloko following a lawsuit by Rodina.
These publications form part of the indicators for the LDPR, the Communists of Russia and Rodina this week, although in content they concern first and foremost the fate of the Yabloko party. In total, Yabloko was mentioned in almost 6,000 posts — this exceeds the comparable figure for New People and is substantially higher than the figures for all the "small parties" remaining in the election race.
Views
The total views of publications about the parties amounted to 225.09 million — 25.18% less than a week earlier. In terms of views, the LDPR grew threefold (from 25.72 to 75.48 million), the Communists of Russia grew 3.5 times, A Just Russia doubled (from 11.94 to 23.88 million), Rodina grew by 48.9% (from 6.69 to 9.96 million), the Direct Democracy Party — by 483.8% (from 18.5 thousand to 107.5 thousand), New People almost did not change its indicators (from 10.57 to 11.02 million). United Russia and the CPRF fell by half (from 116.92 to 57.75 million and from 80.22 to 35.97 million respectively), the Greens — by 29.6% (from 3.00 to 2.11 million), and the Party of Pensioners — by 7.3% (from 1.77 to 1.64 million).
For the first time in several weeks, the LDPR has taken the lead in views (75.48 million versus 57.75 million for United Russia), but is unlikely to be pleased about it. Almost all of the growth is linked to the accident in Moscow — the Aurus car of party leader Leonid Slutsky collided with a motorcyclist. The first reports contradicted each other over who was at the wheel and whether there were any fatalities.
Slutsky's own publication about the meeting with the motorcyclist, the well-known bartender Dmitry Simonchuk, the following day gathered 1.95 million views — more than any other publication of the week, while the analysis of the situation on the Mash channel on MAX added another 468.3 thousand.
For United Russia, the most viewed own publication was Dmitry Medvedev's speech to the activists of the "United Russia Women's Movement" (2.35 million views) on women's contribution to supporting servicemen and to addressing healthcare and demographic issues.
A notable reach was also gathered by the report of Medvedev's words at the same meeting that those who left Russia because of rumours of mobilisation "shouldn't come back" (223.6 thousand views). This is not the first time that Medvedev has spoken sharply negatively about Russians who have left the country at various public events.
For the CPRF, the main reach of the week was gathered by two ongoing storylines around candidates removed from the election. First, rumours of a possible nomination of Nikolai Bondarenko as the party's presidential candidate — a video discussing this topic gained 2.51 million views.
The second large-scale occasion is the reinstatement in the State Duma election of the CPRF candidate Mikhail Matveyev. On 26 August, an appellate court in Nizhny Novgorod overturned the decision of the Samara Regional Court to remove his registration (150.5 thousand views for the main version of the news). The formal grounds for the removal were accusations of copyright infringement over fonts and photographs — the lawsuit was filed by Anna Sarantseva, Matveyev's competitor in the district, who represented the Party of Pensioners.
For New People, a notable reach was gathered by the statement by party leader Alexei Nechayev on the need to tighten control over veterinary vaccines after cases of pets dying — the largest publication on this topic, by the third-party channel "Moscow Live", gathered 224.9 thousand views, while Nechayev's own posts on this and other topics gathered noticeably less.
For the Greens, two storylines moving in different directions stand out this week. On the one hand, the channel "EZh" drew attention to the party's campaign video made with the help of a neural network. In terms of its wording ("choose freedom") and overall tone, it is compared with the campaigning of Yabloko and New People (51.5 thousand views). This impression correlates with how the party has come to be covered on federal television channels — it has clearly chosen the strategy of a spoiler for New People, which is meant to intercept part of the Yabloko electorate flowing to them.
On the other hand, a user in a post titled "Who I definitely will not vote for" (329.6 thousand views, 4.3 thousand reactions) sharply criticises the regional branch of the Greens in Voronezh Oblast, calling the party a front for the interests of the waste reform operators.
For the Direct Democracy Party, with a small absolute volume, the most viewed storyline is not campaigning but information about the party's financing. The channel "NEZYGAR" wrote that the party is financed by a structure linked to the Kovallchuk family (30.1 thousand views).
The channel SOTA pointed out that the party's only sponsor was an aide to a United Russia senator.
We note that even after being removed from the election, Yabloko remains an active participant in the pre-election agenda, trailing in views only United Russia, the CPRF and the LDPR (the mentions of the party removed from the election have more than 24.6 million views). Moreover, these views are largely provided by mentions on well-known information resources unaffiliated with the party.
Engagement
Total engagement (reposts, reactions, comments) fell to 3.85 million — by 32.7% (from 5.72 million a week earlier), that is, the decline is noticeably deeper than in views (-13.0%). People's emotional involvement in this election is predictably declining after the disappearance of the campaign's main storyline. Growth in engagement was shown by the Direct Democracy Party (6.5 times, from a very low base — from 0.4 thousand to 2.6 thousand), the Communists of Russia (by 536%, also from a low base — from 21.4 thousand to 114.7 thousand), the LDPR (by 121.0%, from 460.5 thousand to 1.02 million), Rodina (by 114.1%, from 104.3 thousand to 223.3 thousand), A Just Russia (by 61.5%, from 164.8 thousand to 266.0 thousand) and the Party of Pensioners (by 27.6%, from 25.7 thousand to 32.8 thousand).
United Russia fell (-60.7%, from 2.84 million to 1.12 million), as did the CPRF (-53.2%, from 1.87 million to 875.5 thousand) and the Greens (-50.4%, from 47.4 thousand to 23.5 thousand).
New People remained practically at the previous level (-1.5%, to 180.5 thousand).
For the first time since the start of the monitoring, the LDPR has overtaken United Russia and the CPRF on this indicator. Noticeable engagement was gathered by the news with contradictory initial versions of events about the previously mentioned accident. For example, a publication by one of the publics at the moment when the details of the accident had not yet been established (382.0 thousand views, 8,408 reactions).
For United Russia, engagement fell more sharply than views. The most popular publication about Medvedev's speech to the "Women's Movement" gained 2.35 million views but only 1,483 reactions. More noticeable engagement was gathered by the video analysis by Nikolai Platoshkin's "Change of Course" assessing Medvedev's words about the fulfilment of United Russia's election promises (193.0 thousand views, 6,801 reactions) — an example of how a critical analysis of a party leader's statements provokes a more active reaction from the audience than the live broadcast of the statement itself.
For the CPRF, the most prominent was a quote from party leader Gennady Zyuganov at a meeting with young people and bloggers that Russia currently has "two and a half parties", and the rest are "window dressing". The CPRF's own publication about this meeting gathered 42.4 thousand views and 1,555 reactions, while a retelling of the quote by the third-party channel "Bloody Lady" — 104.2 thousand views with a relatively modest 229 reactions.
For Rodina, the statement by party leader Alexei Zhuravlev on the need to use tactical nuclear weapons became the most resonant quote of the week. No comments from other parties or officials on the substance of this statement were found in the collected data set.
Distribution of publications by platform
The share of VKontakte grew from 40.2% in the tenth week to 62.3% in the eleventh (105,313 publications), the share of Telegram fell from 42.0% to 25.0% (41,746), MAX — from 16.3% to 11.6% (19,550), YouTube — from 1.55% to 1.1% (1,875).
At first glance, this looks like a sharp shift towards VKontakte, but almost the entire effect is explained by a single network: if the 65,130 publications of the network of pages "A Just Russia — News [city]" are subtracted from the count, the share of VKontakte will be 38.7% of the remaining 103,805 publications — practically the same value as a week earlier (40.2%). That is, without this network, the distribution by platform would have remained stable, rather than shifting towards VKontakte.
Administrative resource
This week, the theme of coercing public-sector employees into participating in remote electronic voting (REV) appears several times in the body of publications. State Duma deputy from the CPRF, first secretary of the party's Altai Krai committee Maria Prusakova reported mass complaints from public-sector workers in Altai Krai that employers are coercing them into registering for REV and voting for United Russia, demanding that they send a screenshot of the ballot and threatening dismissal. Prusakova called the threats of dismissal a "bluff" and reminded of the sanctions under Article 141 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (obstruction of electoral rights, up to 5 years' imprisonment).
Separately, she drew attention to the disproportion in the official figures for REV registration. Thus, according to the Ministry of Digital Development, about 187 thousand people registered in Altai Krai — almost as many as in Moscow Oblast, with a population several times smaller and with uneven internet access in the krai's rural areas.
The Kurgan branch of the CPRF published an appeal urging people to report cases of coercion to vote via the special telephone line of the newspaper "Kommunist Zauralya".
A separate specific episode was recorded in Moscow. According to Novaya Gazeta-Europe, public-sector employees were coerced into participating in a test electronic vote on moving the Pushkin monument and were asked to bring other people into participation. Formally, it was about testing the system rather than the State Duma election itself, but one cannot fail to note that the storyline itself echoes the broader theme of the week about the use of official position to boost turnout in the REV system.
In Yekaterinburg, volunteers of the public organisation "Alliance TOS" were handing out T-shirts with a portrait of United Russia candidate Alexei Orlov — free of charge, but on condition of registering for REV. The organisers stated that this was not campaigning. Political scientist Alexander Khanin noted in the same material that in last year's early gubernatorial election in Sverdlovsk Oblast, the share of votes cast for acting governor Denis Pasler via REV turned out to be higher than the share of votes cast by the traditional method.
No own comment from United Russia, the regional election commissions or the organisers of the electronic voting test on the listed episodes was found in the collected body of publications; only the versions of the complainants and independent outlets are given.
Centralised activity: channel networks
The main network story of the week is the VKontakte network of pages "A Just Russia — News [city]": 1,012 individual pages produced 65,130 publications (38.6% of all mentions of the week). Of these, 41,330 publications are an exact, almost unchanged, repetition of one and the same template ("The leader of our party A Just Russia, Sergei Mironov, in con..."), and the remaining 23,800 are the pages' own local posts (for example, about regional legislative initiatives of the party's deputies). In total, the network gathered 6.37 million views, but only 1,928 reactions and comments — that is, on average there is one reaction per 3,306 views.
This differs noticeably from Mironov's own channel, where the best post's 74.96 thousand views drew 537 reactions. Mironov's publications on his own channel receive low but non-zero engagement, whereas their template copies on the pages of the regional network almost provoke no reaction with a comparable reach. We do not have the tools to verify the authenticity of these pages or their subscribers, so we record the fact itself: the content is identical, the network is deployed according to a single template.
New People's content farm of YouTube Shorts videos continues to operate: over the week, 388 videos were found on 11 channels with uniform clickbait titles of the format "What will New People say? #Shorts" (5,906 views, 17 reactions), "What are New People up to? #Shorts" (3,408 views, 124 reactions) or "New People are preparing a surprise #Shorts" (2,891 views, 35 reactions). In total, the farm gathered 276,376 views and 2,664 reactions — noticeably more in reach than a week earlier. The videos do not contain exposé content; this is template activity using the party's name as a keyword for recommendation algorithms.
Also, with mention of New People, publications of the type "I'll pay 1,500 rubles, you just need to vote for our party New People... anonymously" continue to spread in chats unrelated to politics: 117 such publications over the week, all with zero views and reactions — judging by the wording and anonymity, this looks like a scam scheme parasitising on the party's name rather than real campaigning.
Methodology
For the social media monitoring, four platforms currently used by Russians were selected: VKontakte, MAX, Telegram, YouTube. Unfortunately, we are unable to establish effective monitoring of Odnoklassniki and Instagram, which may affect the overall data.
In the course of the analysis, mentions of 11 parties entitled to nominate lists and candidates without collecting voter signatures were used: United Russia, the CPRF, the LDPR, A Just Russia, New People, Yabloko, the Communists of Russia, the Direct Democracy Party, Rodina, the Party of Pensioners, the Greens.
We analysed posts on each platform, and we were interested in the following indicators:
the number of mentions (posts) on social media broken down by political party,
the number of mentions broken down by platform,
engagement (reposts, reactions, activity in comments),
duplicate posts, which very often indicate centralised distribution of materials,
key topics,
the use of the administrative resource.