Last week, the debate over the forced “return” of officials’ children from abroad flared up again with renewed intensity. Supposedly, some rumor started making the rounds, and a number of sources confirmed that any moment now all officials, including employees of state corporations, would be ordered to pull their children out of foreign schools and universities and transfer them to Russian ones.
At the time, I didn’t even bother commenting on it, because there was no point. The formula “I ~~steal~~ earn here and spend there” is so deeply embedded in the value system of the modern Russian official that no decree can uproot it. That, more than anything, is the real United Russia “spiritual bond” (a propagandistic phrase about traditional values).
But I do owe you something, so to speak. I’ve written many times that it’s especially interesting to watch the subjects of our investigations over time—and that’s exactly what we’re going to do now.
You can watch the video, or you can keep reading for all the links and supporting evidence.
Four years ago, we published an investigation with the timeless title “Zheleznyak the Patriotic Little Mattress.” Remember that one? It was about how the daughters of Zheleznyak—the most patriotic of all patriotic deputies—were studying and living in Switzerland and England.
Zheleznyak himself reacted to the investigation quickly and at length. He wrote a Facebook post and gave a pile of interviews and comments, all amounting to the same thing: patriotism was under no threat, his daughters would finish their studies in hostile Europe and then return to live and work in Russia.
Maybe they won’t even finish their studies and will come back sooner, Zheleznyak said.
And so on—you get the idea.
Four years have passed. At this point, I let out a sad, meaningful sigh.
Of course, NO ONE came back anywhere. Of course, Deputy Zheleznyak’s daughters, educated in excellent schools and universities, have absolutely no intention of returning to Russia. Of course, Zheleznyak lied and misled everyone with his stories about his children’s inevitable return to the motherland.
But as often happens with shady liars and hustlers, fate played a cruel joke on Zheleznyak. While Papa Zheleznyak goes on TV foaming at the mouth and convulsing over patriotic themes, the lives of his own daughters have unfolded not just off-plan, but in a way so absurd you couldn’t invent it on purpose.
Before I get to the story itself, I want to make one thing clear. To be honest, I feel a little uncomfortable publishing facts from the lives of Zheleznyak’s children, showing their photos, and so on. They truly are not to blame for the fact that their father is a United Russia crook and loudmouth. They bear no responsibility for their father’s pseudo-patriotism and, as I sincerely believe, have every right to live, do, and think whatever they want, wherever they want. The photos and facts from their lives were gathered exclusively from open sources—no hacked accounts, no private correspondence, nothing like that. These are images and facts that they themselves (or their family) chose to share publicly. Everyone shown in the photos is an adult.
Many of my regular readers will remember this young woman.
This is Anastasia Zheleznyak, the eldest of Sergei Zheleznyak’s four daughters. At the time the post was written four years ago, she was just beginning her studies at Queen Mary University of London.
In 2014, she graduated. We were already expecting to see her in Moscow, but contrary to her father’s patriotic instructions, Anastasia did not start packing for Russia. Instead, she enrolled in a master’s program at another prestigious London university, King’s College.
Alongside her studies—which certainly deserves respect—Anastasia Zheleznyak also started working. And judging by Zheleznyak’s own statements, her father should have felt sick over the career she chose.
She got a job in the very heart of the enemy’s lair, the citadel of anti-Russian propaganda—the BBC. She worked there for several years as a producer’s assistant. Wonderfully ironic, isn’t it? Especially considering that all this time her father was showing up like clockwork in Vladimir Solovyov’s TV studio (a well-known Kremlin-aligned host) to rant about the vile West that was supposedly about to destroy us.
Here, for example, Deputy Zheleznyak firmly declares that there is, of course, no freedom of speech in the United Kingdom.
In 2015, Anastasia also completed her master’s degree. Her name can be found in the list of graduates, confirming that she graduated with honors.
“Time to pack the suitcases again,” we all thought—but no, not this time either. If the story of working for the “enemy” BBC struck you as a bizarre twist of fate, keep reading.
Almost immediately after finishing her master’s degree, Anastasia Zheleznyak got married. To her BBC colleague—a young Scottish man with a genuinely Scottish surname, McClymont, and even a kilt!
The wedding took place in London. A traditional British wedding. No toastmaster, no bride ransom (a traditional Russian wedding game), and I’m quite sure no one rolled an orange from one trouser leg to the other either. Everything was stylish and modest, in a very British way.
Here in the photo is the entire Zheleznyak family. Except for Dad. He’s busy heroically fighting foreigners—those scoundrels are always telling Russia how to live (there’s a wonderful quote about this at 4:08 in our video).
Anastasia changed not only her place of residence, but also her surname. She is now Anastasia McClymont. At the risk of pushing old man Zheleznyak over the edge, Anastasia McClymont will soon also be entitled to a British passport.
I think there is no longer any point in talking about a return to Russia after graduation. Let’s put a big full stop on this story and never again believe a single word Deputy Zheleznyak says.
Anastasia’s sister Elizaveta (second from the left in the family photo), by the way, also lives and works in London. She graduated from an English school:
She also combines work with study; she is an illustrator.
She creates cool, beautiful illustrations and makes videos with her older sister.
Let’s wrap up the stories about the daughters—I think everything is clear enough already. The daughters of the most patriotic of deputies have no intention of returning to the motherland. Everything Zheleznyak babbled about—“they’ll finish studying, come back, and be useful to the country”—is complete nonsense. They are not coming back, at least not while their father and his associates are still sitting in the State Duma. They have already escaped for good from the reality of a Russia occupied by United Russia, and there is no sense in plunging back into it. They combine work with study, are not ashamed of assistant-level positions, do not regard Britons as NATO hirelings, and even start families with them.
I’m not urging Zheleznyak’s daughters to do anything. But I do have one persistent request for the patriotic little mattress himself. I want him, every single time before he sprays patriotic TV studios with spittle, to deliver a short disclaimer: “I, United Russia deputy Sergei Zheleznyak, have sent my family to live permanently in Europe, my son-in-law is Scottish, but I condemn all of it—those rotten Western values, all those Banderites (a derogatory Russian term for Ukrainian nationalists) and the junta, they’re all leeches, and Navalny is a traitor to the nation.” That would be great.