Russia's Duma vote produced a record majority and a measurable gap with reality

Russia's first parliamentary election since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine went as planned. United Russia will hold more seats in the ninth State Duma than in any previous convocation, the other four parliamentary parties are back in reduced form, and the speaker is the same man as before. None of that is new information. What is new is the size of the documented gap between the official count and what independent analysts think Russians actually did on 18–20 September, and the uses the Kremlin is likely to find for the official version.

What the commission announced

The numbers moved between the preliminary and final counts. On 21 September, with 95.18 per cent of precincts counted, the Central Election Commission's chair, Ella Pamfilova, said United Russia had 57.83 per cent of the party-list vote and 355 seats, with the Communist Party (KPRF) on 13.81 per cent, the LDPR on 8.98 per cent, New People on 7.96 per cent and A Just Russia just below the 5 per cent threshold, Meduza reported. The final results, announced on 25 September, gave United Russia 349 seats. The KPRF took 37, the LDPR 23, New People 19 and A Just Russia 17, which cleared the threshold in the end. Rodina won one seat and four independents were elected. A constitutional majority requires 301 seats.

The final figure still beats United Russia's previous record of 343 seats, set in 2016. The commission put turnout at 59.8 per cent, which The Moscow Times describes as the highest for a Duma vote since 2011. OSW, the Warsaw-based Centre for Eastern Studies, gives slightly different final figures from the same commission: turnout of 59.68 per cent, a United Russia share of 57.96 per cent, and 209 of the 225 single-member districts. The commission also said 46 veterans of the war in Ukraine had won seats, 41 of them for United Russia. OSW counts more than 50 such deputies, 49 of them from the ruling party. The difference probably reflects who is counted as a war participant, and neither figure has been independently checked.

The new Duma met on 30 September and re-elected Vyacheslav Volodin as speaker with 406 of the 442 lawmakers voting in favour, according to Meduza. He is the first speaker to lead the chamber for more than two consecutive terms.

How the field was shaped

The outcome was settled before polling day by who was allowed to stand. OSW notes that only ten parties took part, a record low. Yabloko, the only registered party campaigning for peace talks, was removed from the party-list ballot. According to Kyiv Post, the Supreme Court granted a lawsuit by Rodina on 10 August and upheld the ban on 17 August, the same day Yabloko's deputy chairman, Lev Shlosberg, was sentenced to 11 years and one month for anti-war statements. None of Yabloko's 99 candidates in single-member districts won, OSW says, and party leader Nikolai Rybakov and Boris Nadezhdin were among those barred from standing. Candidates from the loyal parties were screened as well. OSW names the Communist politician Nikolai Bondarenko among those excluded.

Pre-election polling put United Russia between 33 and 37 per cent, a range OSW says is likely to reflect the answers respondents consider safe to give rather than their actual preferences. The same paper cites an ExtremeScan survey suggesting that Yabloko, had it been on the ballot, could have taken as much as 24 per cent, against about 32 per cent for United Russia. That estimate comes from a single survey and should be treated with care. It does help explain why the party was removed rather than simply outspent.

The gap between the count and the estimates

Two independent analyses published after the vote reach similar conclusions by different routes. OSW cites estimates based on statistical anomalies that put United Russia's real share at about 34 per cent and turnout below 40 per cent. On that basis the official result was inflated by a factor of 1.5 to 1.7.

Meduza's analysis is more cautious and more specific. Using preliminary returns from 82,124 precinct commissions, about 85 per cent of the total, it found that the core of precincts with ordinary-looking results has barely moved since 2021. If those precincts are taken as unfalsified, United Russia's support rose from about 30 per cent to about 35 per cent in five years. The part of the distribution that has changed is the 'tail' of high-turnout, high-United Russia precincts, which has grown into most of the data. Applying a method published in the journal Significance, Meduza counted nearly 2,250 precincts with anomalously round turnout or vote-share figures, up from about 1,300 in 2021. It calls this the least fair Duma election of the Putin era, while noting that an anomaly is not proof of falsification in a legal sense.

The new voting methods add a layer that no one outside the state can audit. OSW reports that more than 6 million people voted online, in 33 regions, and that early voting covered more than a dozen million registered voters, including about 4 million in occupied parts of Ukraine. In Moscow, Meduza found that nearly 78 per cent of voters cast their ballots remotely. The paper ballots in the capital produce a vertical 'column' of precincts whose spread Meduza cannot yet explain, but which does not resemble ordinary ballot stuffing. St Petersburg went the other way: turnout and United Russia's share there both doubled compared with 2021. OSW also reports that 1,300 KPRF and Yabloko observers were stripped of the right to monitor the vote on its first day.

What the mandate is for

The value of the result to the Kremlin lies in what it can be used to justify. OSW argues that the vote was designed as a plebiscite on the war, at a time when, according to the Levada Center, around 60 per cent of Russians favour peace negotiations. It expects the official majority to be cited as public consent for unpopular measures in the coming months. These could include a new wave of mobilisation, a heavier tax burden and further compulsory contributions from large businesses. These are OSW's projections, not announced policy. But the Duma now has the votes to pass any of them without needing a single deputy outside United Russia.

Within the system, the vote also settles questions of status. OSW calls the result a personal success for Sergei Kiriyenko, who runs domestic politics in the presidential administration. The war veterans now in the chamber serve the purpose Vladimir Putin has set out for a 'new elite', though OSW doubts that they will gain much real influence.

The external response is mostly declaratory

Europe's response has so far been a matter of statements and listings. On 30 September the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe voted 59–0 to declare the new Duma illegitimate, Kyiv Post reported. It urged sanctions on Russia's election commissions, Schengen-wide limits on the movement of Russian officials and fewer tourist visas for Russians. The EU had already listed ten individuals over Yabloko's exclusion, among them three Supreme Court judges and an official in the Prosecutor General's Office, according to JURIST. Kaja Kallas, the EU's foreign policy chief, said on 21 September that the EU would never recognise the vote held in occupied Ukraine.

None of this will change how the Duma works. It does, however, create a record that will matter if any future settlement talks turn to the status of the occupied territories, whose 'representatives' now sit in the chamber.

• Watch whether the Duma moves quickly on mobilisation-related or tax legislation in the autumn session, which would test OSW's reading of the vote as a mandate.
• Watch for further prosecutions of election analysts and observers, and for whether the EU extends its election-related listings to commission officials, as PACE has asked.
• Watch whether Russian sources ever publish the missing precinct returns, including those from the Leningrad region and the occupied territories, which were still absent days after the vote.

Sources

• Meduza — United Russia secures constitutional majority in State Duma with 355 seats as election officials report 59% turnout
• Meduza — Proof that Russia's 2026 State Duma elections were the dirtiest parliamentary elections of the Putin era
• Meduza — United Russia won 349 of 450 seats in Russia's new State Duma. Parliament will include 46 war participants.
• The Moscow Times — United Russia Wins Record State Duma Majority in Elections Dubbed as Most Uncompetitive in Modern History
• OSW Centre for Eastern Studies — Kremlin handpicks new State Duma deputies in 'special election operation'
• JURIST — European Union imposes sanctions on 10 Russian officials over Yabloko ban
• Meduza — Vyacheslav Volodin reelected speaker of the State Duma, Russia's lower house, for third consecutive term
• Kyiv Post — PACE Declares Russia's New State Duma Illegitimate