When Russian Elections Were Actually Competitive (Video)

Something a little different today.

I recently spoke with Jason Blevins of The Kyiv Independent about Russia’s 1996 presidential election—an election in which the outcome was genuinely uncertain.

That may be difficult to imagine today. Vladimir Putin has now ruled Russia for more than a quarter of a century (longer than Soviet leader Brezhnev was in power). Elections are neither free nor fair, political opponents are imprisoned or forced into exile, and most independent media has been shut down, blocked, or driven into exile.

But 30 years ago, Russian politics looked very different.

In June 1996, Russians went to the polls in the first presidential election since the collapse of the Soviet Union. I was following that election closely (and even wrote a book about it!)

In our conversation, Jason and I look back at that election, how Boris Yeltsin triumphed over Communist candidate Gennady Zyuganov, and when I first started to worry about the direction Russia was heading.

Watch our conversation below.