Between irony and skepticism, Russian elites preferred to make s a joke out of it: "Donald Trump or Kamala Harris? In Moscow, we know who Americans really want to vote for... Vladimir Putin!" In the Kremlin chief's entourage, however, the Republican candidate's victory on Wednesday, November 6, does not arouse the same enthusiasm as in 2016, when the billionaire was first elected. "It doesn't matter who gets elected. In the end, Washington is against us. Nothing has changed. Nothing will change," confided a senior Russian diplomat on the eve of the US presidential election.
As Russian political leaders and businessmen alike point out, the hopes they had pinned on Trump's entry into the White House in 2017 were quickly dashed and his supposedly privileged ties with Putin did not materialize into improved bilateral relations. The first US sanctions against Moscow, imposed after the annexation of Crimea in 2014, have not been lifted. On the contrary, they even expanded under the first Trump presidency.
The Kremlin was quick to point out on Wednesday that it would judge Trump on concrete acts. Putin has no plans to call to congratulate him, said his spokesman Dmitry Peskov. "Let's not forget that we're talking about an unfriendly country that's both directly and indirectly involved in a war against our nation," he insisted.
Dmitry Medvedev, the former Russian president who has become one of the most nationalistic voices in Moscow, has already warned: "We have no reason to have high expectations. The elections will not change anything for Russia since the candidates' positions fully reflect the bipartisan consensus on the need for our country to be defeated."
The man who, while Russian leader from 2008 to 2012, had played at being complicit with American presidents and European heads of state and government, today makes no secret of his distrust of Trump, too quickly seen as an ally of the Kremlin: "A tired Trump, spouting platitudes such as 'I will propose an agreement' and 'I have excellent relations with,' will be forced to conform to all the rules of the system. He can't stop the war. Not in a day, not in three days, not in three months. And if he really tries, he could be the new JFK."
Beyond the personality of the American president, it is the establishment in power in Washington that is causing concern for Moscow. "No matter who wins the elections, we don't think the United States's anti-Russian bent can change," criticized Sergey Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister since 2004, on November 1.
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