![Russia Votes in Stolen Land](https://cdn.slatesource.com/c/5/0/c50a27d8-f59a-49cd-bfeb-f114108b0bb2.webp)

# Russia Votes in Stolen Land

- [Made in Slatesource](https://slatesource.com/@steph/russia-votes-in-stolen-land)
- By [Steph](https://slatesource.com/@steph)
- Created on Sep 20, 2026

![](https://cdn.slatesource.com/c/5/0/c50a27d8-f59a-49cd-bfeb-f114108b0bb2.webp)

## 3.5 Million Voters. 8.8 Million People. The Rest Fled.

Russia's State Duma election runs September 18 to 20, 2026. For the first time since Moscow annexed four Ukrainian oblasts in September 2022, residents of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia are being asked to vote in a Russian parliamentary election. Combined, those four territories held roughly 8.8 million people before the full-scale invasion began in February 2022. Russian authorities say 3.5 million voters are now registered. The gap of 5.3 million people represents the dead, the displaced, and the millions living in areas still under Ukrainian control that Russia claims but does not hold. Credit: President of Ukraine (CC0 1.0). Zelenskyy hoists the Ukrainian flag in liberated Kherson, November 2022.

## The First Wartime Duma

The 9th convocation of the State Duma seats 450 deputies: 225 from single-mandate constituency races, 225 by proportional representation among parties clearing a 5% threshold. United Russia dominated the 8th Duma with 49.8% of the vote and 324 seats (out of 450) in the 2021 election. The open question in 2026 is whether turnout in the four new regions delivers the participation figures Moscow needs for its narrative of democratic integration. The Kremlin has been explicit about what this vote is meant to signal: Vladimir Putin, in a speech Wednesday, told residents of the occupied regions they would be voting "for the first time since their reunification with Russia." Russia does not fully control any of the four oblasts it annexed. It holds nearly all of Luhansk but only roughly 55 to 60% of Donetsk, 65 to 70% of Zaporizhzhia, and 50 to 55% of Kherson. Kyiv administers the capitals of both Kherson and Zaporizhzhia.

[NBC News: Russia holds parliamentary vote in areas it illegally annexed from Ukraine](https://www.nbcnews.com/world/russia/russia-holds-parliamentary-vote-areas-illegally-annexed-ukraine-war-rcna598671?utm_source=slatesource)

## Voting Under Guard

Early balloting in the annexed areas opened in late August, weeks ahead of the standard September start. Officials cited security conditions on the ground. At polling stations in Russian-held Donetsk, voters dropped ballots into boxes while armed Russian soldiers stood nearby and watched. Violeta Artemchuk, a coordinator at Donbas SOS, described what the coercion looks like in practice: election commission members go house to house escorted by Russian troops. Pensioners and people relying on social assistance who do not participate risk being added to lists of individuals deemed "disloyal" and losing their benefits. Nine Ukrainian human rights organisations issued a statement calling for residents to boycott, describing the elections as "an attempt to use the electoral process to legitimise the Russian occupation and the attempted annexation."

> Elections held at gunpoint are a farce. The very fact that voting takes place amid endless shelling and bombing reflects the Kremlin's attitude toward the people.

## 5 Territories, Two Timelines

Crimea, seized in 2014, will also vote in this Duma election. It has participated in Russian federal votes since 2016. The four oblasts annexed in 2022 are a new category: territories acquired mid-war, never fully controlled, with populations that have shrunk by a third or more since the invasion began. Ukraine's Defence Intelligence estimated that Donbas alone, which held roughly 7.37 million people in 2001, had fallen to around 3.75 million by early 2024. Since the start of 2026, about 10,000 additional migrants from Central Asia and the Caucasus have been registered in occupied Donetsk Oblast, part of a demographic replacement documented by multiple research organisations. The European Commission spokesperson Christian Wigand described the vote as "another blatant violation of international law." Kyiv urged foreign governments not to recognise results, and warned Ukrainian citizens who organised or assisted the elections that they face criminal liability under Ukrainian law.

[European Platform for Democratic Elections: Russian Election Monitor, preparations update](https://epde.org/?news=russian-election-monitor-update-on-preparations-for-the-state-duma-vote&utm_source=slatesource)

## What the Results Will and Won't Tell You

Results will be announced by Russia's Central Election Commission in the hours after polls close on Sunday evening. Watch for two numbers: the reported turnout in the four annexed regions (the Kremlin needs a figure high enough to sustain the integration narrative), and United Russia's party-list percentage (the 2021 result of 49.8% was already achieved partly through documented fraud and administrative pressure on public sector employees). Neither number will be independently verifiable. There are no international observers. The balloting in the occupied territories has been ongoing, in some areas, for three weeks. The soldiers at the polling stations are not there to prevent fraud.