Читайте українською тут.
Russian propaganda Telegram channels showed little joy over the results of the U.S. presidential election.
On November 4, the United States held its presidential election. The main contenders were Kamala Harris, the Democratic Party candidate and current U.S. Vice President, and Donald Trump, the Republican candidate and former U.S. President, who won and returned to the White House for a second term.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy congratulated Trump on his victory via the social network X (formerly Twitter):
"I appreciate President Trump's commitment to the 'peace through strength' approach in global affairs. This principle can genuinely bring about a just peace in Ukraine. I look forward to working together to make it a reality. We anticipate an era of a strong United States under President Trump's decisive leadership. We count on continued robust bipartisan support for Ukraine in the United States."
During the U.S. election and before the results were announced, propagandists in pro-Russian Telegram channels abandoned any attempts at impartial behavior and gradual ramp-up of anti-Kamala Harris rhetoric. Instead, they began discussing Donald Trump as another bad outcome for Russia.
Analyzing 341 posts across 137 propaganda channels between the start of November 4 and 11:00 a.m. on November 6. This period is between the election date and Zelenskyy's congratulations. The data from the Telegram channels was provided by LetsData.
Topics of messages about the US presidential election. Detector Media with data from LetsData
“Stock Up on Popcorn and Start the 24-Hour Countdown to Peace”
One of Donald Trump’s campaign promises, shared during a speech and on Twitter, stated that the very night his victory is confirmed, he would two people, Putin and Zelenskyy, and they would make a deal within 24 hours.
Russian propagandist Vladimir Solovyov, who has 1.3 million Telegram followers, mockingly remarked, "It looks like it’s time to stock up on popcorn and start the 24-hour countdown."
Despite such promises, Russian propagandists remain skeptical of any concessions from Trump to Russia. A Telegram channel with 77,000 subscribers argued: "Trump's presidency will escalate the hybrid confrontation between Russia and the U.S., deepen Europe’s geopolitical bankruptcy, and lead Washington to an endgame in its struggle with Beijing. How can we expect a peaceful policy from a president who has repeatedly declared his fight against China, which he considers America's main threat? But China is not Iran or even Russia. Given the degree of China's influence in the world, limiting its potential will inevitably be associated with a series of violent military conflicts.”
The same channel suggested that Trump’s foreign policy as the 47th U.S. president would largely mirror Joe Biden’s, particularly, in the Middle East, Trump would continue to support Israel and counter Iran’s influence, stating:
"Knocking Iran off the geopolitical chessboard will largely nullify the efforts of Moscow and Beijing, as Russia and China will lose an instrument of pressure on other regional actors through Iran. In Asia, Trump will strengthen military and political cooperation. It is possible that the White House will begin to impose sanctions on those Asian companies that do not adhere to the course of minimizing cooperation with China.”
Another Telegram channel with 153,000 subscribers predicted that Trump’s return to power and continuation of Biden’s geopolitical course would hasten the collapse of the United States, cynically commenting, "We will later come to remember Biden, the autistic grandpa, fondly. We will see his dementia differently, as a virtue, and the self-destruction of the United States as a natural and logical process. It will all end with Trump.”
The narrative of the "decay" of the United States has long been a theme in Soviet, and later Russian, propaganda. Propagandists continuously attempt to identify signs of the "collapse" of their rivals. However, democratic regimes are less susceptible to sudden collapses compared to totalitarian or authoritarian regimes like those in Russia, China, and Iran. The dissolution of the USSR serves as evidence of this, as detailed in study on the resilience of democratic and autocratic regimes by Steven Levitsky and Lucan A. Way, as well as Adam Przeworski, Michael Alvarez, and their colleagues. According to their findings, democratic regimes are more flexible in implementing reforms, better equipped to avoid crises, and more capable of recovering from them due to the stability of their institutions. Despite this, propagandists eagerly predict actions in the U.S. that could harm Donald Trump or the country itself, even though, since the 19th century, presidents from opposing parties in the U.S. have peacefully transitioned power.
“But the period of the old president's departure is dangerous, because the pack of global criminals realizes that they have not just lost something, but that their time has run out as a system. A collective Biden can allow Ukraine to strike deep into Russian territory with long-range weapons, to use the biological weapons that are there. A dirty nuclear bomb. The time has come when this rabble doesn't care what happens to the world, because for them the future is prison or an electric chair,” wrote a Telegram channel with 44 thousand subscribers.
Such statements disregard the fact that the administration of the Democratic president has resisted calls for almost three years to provide Ukraine with long-range weapons or authorize attacks deep into Russia. Claims about American biological weapons in Ukraine or a "dirty bomb" made from nuclear waste are outright fabrications meant to justify Russian aggression against Ukraine.
However, the obvious illogical nature of such claims does not deter propagandists. Now, they argue that the impending "start of World War III" is not due to Biden’s alleged "bloodthirstiness" but because Democrats now have "their hands untied":
“Starting tomorrow, Democrats will not need to demonstrate to voters that they are dealing with internal affairs, not Ukraine, just as Zelenskyy will not need to ‘stay in the shadows' to avoid handing Trump the 'World War III' card,” wrote a Telegram channel with 43 thousand subscribers.
Propagandists have also spread lies about the U.S. presidential election. For instance, in a Telegram channel with 47,000 subscribers and at least nine others, a Greek-Catholic priest from Ivano-Frankivsk was falsely attributed with saying, "Trump is the Antichrist. The Devil. His arrival will mark the end of the world." However, the video containing these alleged remarks was a deepfake, as confirmed by the Ivano-Frankivsk Archdiocese of the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church.
“Trump Will Try to Shift the Burden of the War in Ukraine to Europe”
Some propagandists claim that Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. elections would result in the United States withdrawing its support for Ukraine and transferring the responsibility for aiding Ukraine to European nations. According to the Kiel Institute, the U.S. has provided the most financial assistance to Ukraine. Between January 24, 2022, and August 31, 2024, the U.S. allocated over $80 billion in aid to Ukraine, with approximately $57 billion directed towards military support, and the rest for humanitarian and financial assistance. During the same period, EU institutions provided around $44 billion, while Germany, the third-largest donor, contributed nearly $16 billion.
An occupation Telegram channel from Crimea with 6,700 subscribers commented: “In the United States, Donald Trump became president again. Somewhere, the Ukranian Nazis and their European curators became anxious."
The Telegram channel of Russian outlet Izvestia, with nearly 139,000 subscribers, claimed that if Kamala Harris had become president, she would have continued the current support for Ukraine and Israel. However, “Trump is likely to do his best to shift the financial burden from the US to Europe, which will have a number of consequences.”
Propagandists also suggested that Trump would seek personal revenge against Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy:
"But as for Zelenskyy personally, Donald has a personal score to settle with this little prick. Thanks to his treason, they tried to impeach Trump. Donald hasn't treated the clown very well before, but he doesn't forgive or forget this kind of thing at all. And most likely, [Zelenskyy] will face very difficult times. They will find corruption, and everything in between. Especially since it doesn't take long to find it,” wrote a propaganda Telegram channel with 166 thousand subscribers.
Propagandists alluded to the 2019 phone call between Zelenskyy and Trump during Trump’s first term as U.S. president, which led to an impeachment inquiry. Trump was accused of pressuring Zelenskyy to have the Ukrainian law enforcement agencies charge Joe Biden and his son Hunter, who previously worked for a Ukrainian energy company, with corruption. Zelenskyy denied that he had taken Trump's words about prosecuting the son of the then US president's political opponent as pressure. Trump completed his term in office and was not removed from office.
Propagandist and Deputy Chairman of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev also promoted the narrative that Trump’s election would end U.S. support for Ukraine:
“Trump has one quality that is useful to us: as a businessman to the core, he hates to spend money on various freeloaders and profiteers — on stupid allies, on bad charity projects, and on voracious international organizations. Toxic Bandera's Ukraine is on the same list,” he wrote on his channel with 1.4 million subscribers.
His post was cited at least 17 more times in the analyzed sample. According to LetsData, the total number of views of posts with Medvedev's quotes is 317 thousand.
In a pro-Russian Ukrainian Telegram channel with over a million subscribers, a post beginning with the hashtag #слухи (#rumors) claimed that an inspector from the current U.S. presidential administration had allegedly arrived in Ukraine. This inspector's supposed mission was to oversee the "cleanup" of documents related to U.S. support for Ukraine, as it was suggested that Donald Trump, upon taking office, would initiate an audit of aid to Ukraine.
“It will not end with mere words about large-scale corruption in Ukraine. All these weeks, Kyiv has been cleaning up all traces and possible 'controversial' papers/documents/protocols/reports... Trump will use this track as one of the main media strikes against the Democrats,” the propaganda Telegram channel said in a post.
Meanwhile, Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, expressed a contrasting view, downplaying any potential advantages of a Trump victory: "In general, Russia does not care how these elections end, given that there is a bipartisan consensus in the United States on confrontation with our country," her comments were quoted in a Telegram channel with nearly 162,000 subscribers.
In pro-Russian Telegram channels, news about the U.S. election results is sometimes framed as a "miraculous" event, unequivocally favorable to Russia.
"The ruble and Russian stock indices surged after reports of Trump’s victory. The dollar fell below 96 rubles, Gazprom’s stock rose by 5%, and the MOEX index climbed to 2,680 points," claimed a Telegram channel with 470,000 subscribers, as well as four more.
In a smaller Telegram channel with 40,000 subscribers, the impact of the U.S. elections on the Russian stock market was described as follows:
"American media and officials are scrambling to announce Trump’s victory in the elections. The Republican is preparing a speech for his supporters... Interestingly, Russian company stocks are rising, and the ruble is strengthening. But for ordinary Russians, the only change will probably be who urinates on their stairwells."
Despite the narrative framing in these and other posts analyzed, Russian propagandists do not appear particularly optimistic about Trump’s election, even though they had previously worked to undermine Kamala Harris's chances of becoming U.S. president. Their messaging suggests that Russia is unlikely to change its narrative about the U.S. and will continue to portray it as Russia's "main enemy." While some propagandists speculate that the burden of supporting Ukraine may shift more to European allies, they remain skeptical about any positive developments. They emphasize that Trump will likely maintain a policy of strong opposition to Russia and China, similar to that of Joe Biden.
Another recurring theme in the propaganda is that Trump’s personal attitude toward Volodymyr Zelenskyy might lead to reduced U.S. support for Ukraine and guarantee an investigation into American aid to the country.
Main page illustration and infographics by Nataliya Lobach
