Putin’s daughter will fix our genes; the Todorenko scandal; Sobchak and Zakharova — the elite

[music]

Good evening, everyone. In Moscow, it's 8:02 p.m.

I apologize for the fact that

we delayed the start of the broadcast a little, but

in any case, we're still live.

This is the *Russia of the Future* program, and I am

its permanent host, Alexei Navalny, and

today I am a “celluloid doll,” so we

had to close the window because

motorcyclists are roaring outside. We'll shut everything, and today I am

a “celluloid doll,” as Vladimir Solovyov called me.

Vladimir Solovyov. Let's listen to

this wonderful man:

“When, in all seriousness, that little fool by the name of

Navalny, that cold little doll,

starts reasoning about some three parts—

yes, that fool Navalny, that

celluloid doll.” Vladimir Solovyov

has made my task easier. I mean, of course,

among the huge number of

state media outlets, you can always

pick some funny nickname

they've used for me, but Solovyov

burst onto YouTube and started doing

giant broadcasts, and there are plenty of absolutely

great names there. As I said, he

apparently does it on purpose because

he likes that I show clips from him on my

broadcast, thereby promoting

his YouTube channel. Well, basically,

big YouTube channels should help

small and new ones, so

basically, a big strong channel

is extending a helping hand to this half-dead

newcomer named Vladimir Solovyov. As for

long broadcasts, I don't know

how much time we'll spend together today.

I kept cutting, cutting, cutting

the script for you, and then suddenly it

turns into something huge every time. But don't

be alarmed—if anything, write, write. I don't

know, just write to me in big capital

letters: “That's it, log off, we're sick of it,” with

the hashtag #RussiaOfTheFuture on Twitter. They will

pass your questions on to me, and I

will answer them. The news that

came literally five minutes before we went on air

is that Russian Prime Minister Mikhail

Mishustin has been diagnosed with coronavirus. We do not

like Mikhail Mishustin. We consider him

a crook and a thief. We know that he is a crook and

a thief; we have proven it many times. The most

popular investigation this year was about

Mikhail Mishustin. But of course I

wish him good health. He should get through this

completely healthy and, sooner or later,

stand trial and answer for all

the things he did together with

his accomplices, when he and

they, while sitting in the tax service, stole from

the Russian budget billions. But everything

that is happening with Mishustin—well, let's forget

that he is a crook. He is a human being,

a high-ranking person, a person

around whom, you know, they built

a large number of cordons and

medical, and also social and cultural, protections.

You can't accuse Mishustin of

having, you know, gone out for a barbecue

without listening to Dr. Malysheva (a well-known Russian TV doctor), or

having listened to

her and then gone and gotten wasted with the guys

and, I don't know, run after someone at a

village disco, and therefore

caught coronavirus. No—Mishustin

is at the very center of a situation

where people have the ability to take

the maximum possible measures against

coronavirus, and nevertheless he got sick. Here it is

appropriate to recall how certain

state media gloated when

Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister of

the United Kingdom, fell ill. Now the same thing has happened in Russia.

This shows us that this is

a dangerous disease, and it is very difficult

to protect yourself from it. And most importantly—again,

forgive me, I'm just like

a ram staring at a new gate (a Russian idiom meaning someone fixated on one thing), repeating the same thing—this

can affect anyone. Therefore we need

to help everyone now, absolutely everyone. Well,

now Mishustin is down, and instead of him

Belousov is acting in his place—a

much more hellish economic

figure. He is known for always

being portrayed by journalists as—

in reality it's not quite so simple—there is a kind of

liberal wing in the government and

in economic policy overall—people like Kudrin and the like—and

then there are these hellish satans

who want to immediately spend all

the money on gigantic state

projects. Belousov represents

that wing, although of course this is a simplified

picture. So one can assume that if

God forbid something happens with Mishustin, if

this drags on longer, if he gets sicker and

is out for a long time, then Belousov

will begin an amazing money giveaway, and

he will be handing it out to large companies,

to oligarchs, not to people at all, even though it is

clear that people are the ones who need money. Mishustin

got sick, but anyone could get sick—

the father of a family, the mother of a family, any

person who is the head of a household.

If that person gets sick, the family may already have

lost its income, and all the more so now it has

lost income. There is no money. You need a whole room,

you need to isolate the person so that he

stays there, no one goes in, and he is treated.

You need medicine, you need to buy it. Mishustin

can get medicine—he'll be fine—but

how many such Mishustins are there? We

already understand now that

the scale of the epidemic

does not match the official figures, and

getting sick right now is very expensive. Therefore

people need to be given money. Therefore I still urge you—

I still urge you, there has already been a lot...

The signatures have probably totaled around

a million.

But even so, well, this program is watched

by a much larger number of people in a week

than have signed on the website so far.

Frankly, this really upsets me.

It means I haven’t found

the right words for you,

the words needed to convince everyone, and so on.

It also means that you, of course, don’t believe

in signatures and all that. But still,

this has to be done very quickly.

We need to make sure a lot of people hear about it

and that many people demand it, because we

will talk about this today. Apparently,

the quarantine measures will be lifted from May 11 არა

not because the epidemic will be over, but because

because they simply do not want

to give out money.

But our task in any case, even if

the quarantine measures are lifted, is that April has passed

while we were sitting under all these

well, essentially under

self-isolation rules. For this April, give people

money. Even if everything is lifted tomorrow,

we are not withdrawing our demand for direct support

for people, and we believe that

for April, the government should give each person

20,000 rubles (about US$215), because that is a fair

and reasonable compensation. Even

Mishustin has fallen ill, so in that case let’s

give everyone money, because people are getting sick, people

are paying for medicine, and so on.

I’m going to talk about this in detail now.

But I saw statistics: in 40 or 37

regions, a so-called mask

regime has been introduced. Has anyone been given masks for free there?

They have to be bought—that’s a separate issue.

They aren’t available, but you’re still supposed to buy them.

You don’t give people free masks, but you tell them:

if you go outside

without a mask, you’ll be punished. But how are you supposed

to buy one? Sure, it’s 100 rubles, 400 rubles,

500 rubles (roughly US$1–5), but you still have to find the money and pay.

So if you want people to pay out of their own pockets,

to come up with the money themselves and pay,

then why is it impossible to squeeze anything out of the budget?

They won’t give it, they won’t. And now, interestingly enough,

notice how, through various

people—both openly pro-government ones and

obvious pro-

propagandists, and even moderately

opposition-minded publicists and

commentators—they are pushing the idea that

well, in wartime, it’s wartime, guys.

There’s an epidemic right now, a serious problem, so

let’s just stop

criticizing the government for now.

Let’s all pull together, defeat this

coronavirus, and then, in peacetime,

we’ll criticize. But right now, anyone who criticizes

is suspicious—what do they want?

Do they want their own people to lose?

Why are they going after Putin now? This is not the time

for criticism. And perhaps the best

version of this was voiced by my favorite propagandist,

Vladimir Pozner (a well-known Russian TV host), because he is, of course,

the most sophisticated propagandist.

Even now, in 2020, it’s amazing

to watch how a large number of

seemingly normal people just kind of

turn to mush and melt when

they see Pozner, and there he is, all smooth and polished, and he

says these things, and he speaks very well,

very elegantly, and he constantly reminds everyone that

he is a citizen of three countries and has spent a lot of

time in France, and can pronounce French

restaurant names with charm.

And people completely fall for this

nonsense. But in my view, this was one of the most

outrageous statements that

has been made. Let’s listen to the clip; I’ll

stay in the corner, because this is Channel One (Russia’s main state TV channel),

and I’ll

be insulting the wonderful

Vladimir Pozner with my presence. Fifty-nine seconds on why

you must not criticize the government in difficult times.

On the internet and in a number of our

media outlets, including

some that are not ours, there are very often appearances by

opponents of President Putin and the current

authorities. But what strikes me is that often, in

these appearances,

there is poorly concealed, and sometimes even

openly gloating

commentary about the number of

people infected,

the number of deaths. And I think, perhaps

for the duration of the pandemic,

at a time when the country as a whole is fairly

tense, when people are tense too, and many are

confused,

perhaps for this period it would be worth setting aside

your grievances and accusations.

Perhaps it would be better to direct your efforts,

your energy, your mind, toward

supporting people’s hopes, and only later,

when the pandemic subsides,

return to your usual concerns.

Well, you see how all of this sounds

logical enough: the country is tense right now, maybe

we should direct our efforts…

Alexander writes: what should be done about attempts

to throw medical students into the line of fire

in the fight against COVID? Indeed, today

there are simply huge numbers of people on Instagram

who study at medical colleges and

are writing that they are being forced

—medical college students, and also those at

medical faculties—

people whose specialties are only loosely related to this,

for example cosmetologists,

write that they are being made to go work in these

hospitals, supposedly as internships, and for free.

And these people too, for example—are they also not supposed

to criticize the government right now?

You see, on Instagram, students are writing en masse that they are being

forced to work.

for free

But if it's effectively martial law and we

are supposed to

then all stand together, shoulder to shoulder,

and not criticize the government, then

fine, we've propped up the government with our shoulder,

and we say: come on, Volodya, Vladimir,

Vladimir Putin, Vladimir Vladimirovich,

Posner, go ahead — but what about the government?

Doesn't it want to push a little

in the other direction? But these medical students —

fine, say 20,000 rubles to each of them

— that's what we're demanding. Why should they have to work

for free, while all the others — Rosgvardiya

troops, various police officers,

Mikhail Mishustin goes on sick leave, but

he still gets paid. Why should medical students

have to do this for free?

Again, there's a gigantic budget and enormous

amounts of money — some mythical 17 or 18

trillion rubles. So maybe they should be paid

a salary, for example, for what they'll be doing?

No, no — we all have to shut up and

help the beloved government because

these are hard times, and I can't calmly

watch Vladimir Pozner (a well-known Russian TV host) as he

once again tells us about hard

times, because he's exactly the kind of person

who has spent his whole life talking about hard times,

about hard times — his whole life, all his

life he has always had some explanation for why

the government is right, while the people — or these

as he put it, "certain people" —

who criticize the authorities are somehow gloating, or whatever.

This man has been doing this his whole life. Here, a video —

I'll show you now.

It's 1979. Little Alexei Navalny is 3

years old; he's not watching TV yet, but

Vladimir Pozner, even back then, already

in a turtleneck and a soft little jacket,

is looking into the camera very intelligently

and explaining: these dissidents — no one

is afraid of any dissidents in Russia

or the Soviet Union; they're just breaking the law, listen.

If they break the law, they must be

punished. Back then they were locked up in psychiatric hospitals

for nothing at all — for "slandering"

the Soviet system.

People would come out and say, you know,

there is no real socialism in the Soviet Union,

there's nothing to eat — and you'd be jailed

instantly. Ordinary people were jailed

just like that. And then Vladimir

would come along and say, my God, look, there's an article of law,

this is Soviet propaganda — they need to be imprisoned.

And if you break the law, you must be

prepared for that. 1979 — let's watch. "In your country

there are a small number of dissidents. Why does

your government in your country seem so

afraid of them?" — "No one is afraid."

"Why do you think it's afraid?" "Then why

is life so difficult for them here?" "Well,

life is difficult for them because they are few, and because

in general they are going against

the colossal majority.

And of course life is hard for them, but no one is

afraid of them. Another matter is that when they

break certain laws, when that

happens — and far from all of them break the law —

the law is the law. You may like it or not,

but it must be respected.

If you break it, then you should expect

the consequences. But no, they are not really

afraid of them."

You see? They're all like that, at any

time, under any regime — the very same

people sitting there on television,

including on state TV. They used to be

Soviet propagandists, then they became

democratic propagandists, and now they are

— forget ideology altogether — simply

Putin's propagandists for a thieving system, and they

always find a reason

to explain to us why there are certain

outcasts who criticize

the government, that they are breaking laws — but what kind

of government is this anyway? Right now everyone is

completely rallying behind the authorities: let's once again

support them because these are hard times. And it has always been

about hard times.

Look it up on YouTube.

During the Afghan war, he said that

it was the right decision. When the USSR shot down

the Korean airliner, he said they had not

shot down any Korean plane. We must

unite in times like these. The government always

has a reason to lie, and that lie is always

made to sound so convincing. What's more, they also

try to climb onto a hill of moral

superiority and from there tell us

how shameful we are. Like right now, when it's so

hard for the country, in the middle of an epidemic, and you

are saying things with a certain malicious glee.

You know,

dear Vladimir Pozner, all the rest of us

are speaking not with glee, but rather

with a kind of desperation, because, well,

what is your government doing? We

launched this "Five Steps" campaign, and

the entire political establishment

said it was nonsense. We simply

put out a call: guys,

tell us your personal stories. And these

personal stories — I'll show you two small ones,

from completely different people,

from different walks of life, and there are

tens of millions of such people.

What are they guilty of? In what way

have they wronged this government?

Here, yes — Tatyana from Kostroma worked at a

jewelry factory.

Let's watch her story. "Hello, my name is Tatyana.

I worked at one of the jewelry factories

in the Kostroma region. Due to the coronavirus

epidemic, my company

laid me off.

My loans and utility payments at the moment

right now...

monthly

exceed the amount I will still be receiving

only in unemployment benefits from the employment office

labor

the federal and regional authorities

are providing no support in this situation, and I

don’t know what to do in this situation. I

signed the petition “Five Steps to”

which I urge you to support as well. It is the only

way to survive the epidemic

damn it, this is nonsense

So Tatyana—how exactly is she supposed to

rally around the government now? Why shouldn’t she

be allowed to criticize it? How is she

supposed to unite around it? But here’s the thing:

this person worked at a factory

I mean, not some hipster, not a journalist

not a businessman—worked at a factory, and

was laid off. And generally, in theory, it’s assumed that

for some of these ordinary people

who were laid off, there are procedures and they are given

some kind of assistance. But she wasn’t given any help

so why, how exactly is she supposed to

love the government now, when she

paid taxes? She works in Kostroma Oblast

(a region in western Russia)

Some of you may have been surprised

to hear the phrase, “I worked at a

jewelry factory in Kostroma Oblast,” because

that is traditionally a region with a huge

number of jewelry factories

located there

But people are being laid off, so how can they

possibly love the government now? They can’t

not at all. Now, a completely different

story: an entrepreneur from

Yekaterinburg. Let’s hear from him. Hello,

my name is Vladimir Pan, I am a co-owner

of a chain of cafeterias in the city of Yekaterinburg. Due

to the events

related to the quarantine, my cafeterias

are closed, my employees are not working, and all

the funds I had available, I

have already paid out to my employees. I no longer

have the ability to keep paying

so people are left without money. How my

business will fare after

the quarantine measures are lifted, I also do not know

That is why Mr. Navalny’s proposal

“Five Steps for Russia” seems to me very

timely and necessary. First of all, it

will help my employees survive—this money,

these payments, these monthly payments

And then it may also help

me survive as an entrepreneur, because

Navalny proposes paying all

businesses and entrepreneurs 3.2 trillion

rubles and cancel taxes

To collect taxes when we are currently not

working is, at the very least, absurd. I signed

this petition, and I urge you to sign

Mr. Navalny’s petition

Thank you

[music]

As I understand it, my words—“damn, this is

nonsense”—from the previous video made it into

the broadcast somehow. I apologize; I just

thought it would be trimmed down a bit, shortened

But in fact, right now we

are flooded with a huge number

of personal stories

There is simply no money. And yet somehow they

seriously have the nerve to say

“let’s rally around the government”

Fine—but if the government has no money

and does not want to pay, then maybe

they should have prepared the country better. And

right now the government is generally on very good terms

with the WHO, the World Health Organization,

because there

international institutions have been quite

complimentary toward the Russian

government and did not criticize it for

anything

But then it published—well, this is not some

malicious American source or anyone else

it is an organization in which Russia sits on every

more or less significant commission—and it

published a ranking

of countries’ preparedness for epidemics. Do you know

what place we took there? 49th

We ranked 49th there. The ranking reflects

each state’s ability

to cope with unforeseen crises

in the healthcare system, taking into account

the number of hospital beds, doctors, and

nurses per 10,000 people. But

of course, we carried out the so-called

“optimization” here—everything was cut back

cut and slashed, and it turned out—whoops

we are in 49th place, with 48 countries

ahead of us. And for that too, we’re not supposed to

criticize the government? Well, because they

were obviously doing everything wrong in terms of

preparing for the epidemic, and now they are doing

everything very badly in terms of fighting this

epidemic as well. I mean, when I

was preparing this, I did not yet know that Mishustin

had fallen ill. That is one of the new

striking examples—they could not even protect

the top leadership, the most important people. But people are

completely

different, including young people, and those who

are, generally speaking, in the upper

part of society in terms of their

ability to access medical care

This week, for example, a

34-year-old employee from the

Sixth Department died

of the Government Communications Directorate, and he went

to an FSB hospital, and at that hospital he

came in, they asked him

if he had been coughing, if he felt unwell

As I understand it, colleagues describe him, and they

asked whether he had been in contact with foreigners

He said no, he had not

and they told him: no test for you,

not indicated, not indicated, not indicated—but in the end

It all ended with him winding up in

the hospital, likewise on a ventilator

and he died. He was 34 years old, 34

years old.

A death from coronavirus. But this really

is the point: this was someone being treated in Moscow

at an FSB departmental hospital (a hospital run by Russia’s Federal Security Service).

So what does that say about the rest of Russian

medicine? There’s absolutely none of it, and we

are supposed to be grateful for it. Right now

we’re supposedly meant to rally around something. Yes, I

think this is exactly the moment

when we should be criticizing and going after this

government. But we’re not calling on

people to leave their homes or anything like that.

But right now the situation is such that they

can’t lie about their organizational,

political, or any other kind of incompetence.

They can’t. All the measures

taken by our government—today there was

an absolutely brilliant headline about Putin.

Everyone reposted it on social media. I

was even going to show it at the beginning—it was about mattresses.

Putin said that he is confident in

growing demand for mattresses, and that, that

perfectly characterizes the situation.

It’s some kind of hellish circus where

no one understands what is happening and

no one understands what the government is doing.

It’s been a month now, I think exactly a month today,

since we all started sitting at home.

Do you—do you understand the government’s

strategy, what it is doing from the standpoint

of assistance, from the standpoint of fighting

coronavirus? What strategy is there? No. I

am sure you don’t understand, and no one

understands what they are doing. From the standpoint

of isolation—first they said masks

weren’t needed, now masks are mandatory for everyone.

At first they were against mass testing,

now they seem to be in favor of mass

testing, but that mass

testing still is not actually being carried out. No

one understands. A certain level

of chaos exists in every country because

this is something new. But in Russia, for the most part,

they talk but do not do anything, basically.

They just sit and wait, like,

someone died, someone didn’t—well, that’s just how it is.

We’ll probably just wait out some amount

of time. And from the standpoint of

this same isolation, fines, and

punishments, it’s also just some kind of

peak chaos. That Moscow hostel—I

when I watched it, our Moscow штаб (operational headquarters) made

a video about it, and I thought: this

cannot be real. We actually have in Moscow

a hostel—well, a hostel, an ordinary cheap hotel.

Some people arrived there,

people at the

hostel. One of them had been in contact with someone, and they

literally locked them inside that hostel—

strangers who had come from different places—

and are keeping them there. Let’s watch, 1 minute 14 seconds.

So how did you end up there, and how many

people are there? After that, the hostel became

sealed off; employees of Rospotrebnadzor (Russia’s consumer safety watchdog)

issued orders prohibiting

people from leaving the premises. In the closed hostel,

with each passing week more and more

people are falling ill. At the moment, several

have been taken to the hospital, but many who came down

with coronavirus remained in the hostel

to self-medicate. What happens when

couriers bring you food? Do they also

bring it upstairs?

We are being kept in absolutely unacceptable conditions.

There is no protection at all. Even the antiseptics that

used to be in the kitchen were removed.

As punishment, the administrator showed

that the water had been turned off—as punishment.

They removed the antiseptics as punishment. And one more thing:

the shift

And what were you punished for? For not

obeying.

That’s how I understand it.

One more thing: today they cut off our electricity.

That is, the lights in the rooms do not work.

Only a few people still have working

outlets.

So, 50 random people are there, like in

some film like *And Then There Were None* (known in Russian as *Ten Little Indians*),

gathered somewhere, then someone got sick,

they took him away, and locked the rest in.

Then, as usual, they turned off the lights and

turned off the water, locked the place, and what is

supposed to happen? If there is a risk

of illness, then let’s test them,

send them home, after all.

You cannot just take random people,

lock them up with a padlock, and

not let them out. And in the end, okay, Misha—

now Mishustin has fallen ill, Mishustin got

coronavirus, confirmed.

Confirmed. How is that any different from

the hostel? It’s the same thing: there is a hostel,

they locked it up, and there is the government building.

Mishustin got sick, so

let’s just go up to the government building,

put a huge padlock on it,

lock everyone inside, and let them sit there.

And then, in exactly the same way, raise plastic bottles

with some food up to them there. But that is

complete nonsense. And even in matters like these,

there is simply no

plan whatsoever. And there was a huge scandal after

our Moscow штаб (operational headquarters) published a video saying

things were supposedly improving, while these people had their water cut off.

The Moscow government says

it will solve this problem, but this is

a very strange thing, because at

any construction site, if sick people are identified, at

any workplace, in any group, anywhere—

and again, they recently created

huge traffic jams across the city because of the metro checks, but at the same time one

idiot for some reason decided that this

hostel—let’s lock up the dormitory.

An astonishing story, absurd once again.

Thank you very much to everyone who took part in

Smart Voting, because the rector

of this university, Natalia Pochinok,

a disgusting United Russia member, and you and I

managed to throw her out.

She did not become a deputy there;

Maxim Kruglov won, excellent, now representing

Yabloko in that district.

Simply thanks to Smart Voting. But

just look at what this person is actually doing.

She has a dorm there, students in it,

students living in the dormitory,

and the students living in the dormitory are subject to

the usual Moscow rules, the ordinary

Moscow rules that I live by too.

They mean that, well, if you need to,

you go to the store, and if you need to go to the store,

or go to the pharmacy, you go to the pharmacy.

The same applies to students, yes, they

Again, we do not have an official quarantine in Russia;

there is no official quarantine in

Russia, only self-isolation, so students

are supposed to observe self-isolation. That means

this United Russia member simply issues

an order saying: no, everyone must stay locked

up, and they are literally being kept

under lock and key. Here, a person is recording:

look, here is the order, yes: it is forbidden

to leave the dormitory, and it is forbidden to

order anything online, you understand, through

the internet, the purchase of goods is prohibited.

Show it again, I just didn’t manage

to read it. There was also text saying it is forbidden

to purchase goods via the internet, and

courier delivery too. But excuse me, I am

sitting at home, and if they told me that I was not

allowed to have anything delivered here by courier,

well, that is already called prison.

That is not called self-isolation.

No one can forbid anything like that, except

within the limits of the law, I mean.

And they were told: so, sit here,

you cannot order anything, and you are under arrest.

Here, for 30 seconds, a person is trying to leave

the dormitory, look.

[music]

The person got out, well, after a scandal.

He called the police, because, well, he called

the police, the police came and said,

indeed, they had no right not to let him out, and he left.

After that scandal, they did not

let him back in, and then they sent him a notice by email saying that he had been

expelled. I mean, what for? Why?

They sent a notification. And this student,

an honors student, you understand, an excellent student, he was

expelled for leaving the dormitory.

But everyone leaves their homes, so what

is going on? What outrages me here

is that it simply shows that there is

no strategy, no plan, no

law at all, just some kind of lawlessness, some

kind of nonsense. This rector, for this

order banning students from

leaving and from receiving the things they need,

should be prosecuted. This is abuse of

official authority. This is simply

an overreach of official powers.

It is outrageous: she just went ahead and expelled a student.

This student recorded a video, he

told his story. Let’s listen.

What is simply astonishing here is that

it means a rector appointed by

the state, a civilian official,

can now actually impose

a prison-like regime on her own

students, who are not subordinate

to her in that sense at all. She is not some kind of commandant.

A dormitory manager has no right to restrict you in anything.

I mean, these are simply

ordinary civilians who live

there, just as if my building manager right now

said that Navalny (Alexei Navalny, Russian opposition politician) was

forbidden to leave his apartment and

to order anything delivered home. It is the same thing.

But this is happening to students. Let’s watch.

Hello, my name is Anton Ocheretin, and

together with the other students, I was

not allowed to leave the dormitory building.

We were also forbidden from receiving

deliveries ordered online. On April 25,

I tried to leave the dormitory, but I was not

allowed out. The administration cited

quarantine; however, they could provide no documents

confirming

that there was a quarantine in the dormitory.

The administration was unable to do so.

With the help of the police, on April 26 I was able

to leave the dormitory.

However, I was unable to return.

And together with Daniil Petrov,

Daniil,

we were left out on the street. On the 27th, we found out

that Daniil and I had been expelled on the basis of

Clause 2 of Order No. 505 dated April 22,

signed by the rector.

This order was removed from the official

website.

Right now, the dormitory building houses

a very large number of

international students,

as well as students from the Russian Federation,

who cannot leave it.

They are very frightened and are in an extremely

distressed emotional state.

That is why I say this is chaos. And this is not even

some story from far away; this is Moscow.

It is not as if some news came from somewhere far away in the Urals

about a petty tyrant boss in a village forbidding people

to leave a dormitory. This is all happening in Moscow.

People are posting videos online,

saying: guys, they have locked everything down here completely.

I mean, no one is getting in, no one is getting out,

and nothing is happening at all, because

nobody understands the basic concept here:

what are we doing — keeping them locked up, or allowing them

to move around? The countries that are

handling the spread of the

coronavirus much better than we are give people

They allow people to run, for example, to exercise,

to do physical exercise, and generally just walk more,

while keeping a certain distance. Here, on the one hand,

there’s chaos, and on the other hand,

they’re looking for someone to blame, and overall the strategy is completely unclear.

That is, it’s just totally unclear.

Putin has spoken four times, and we still

haven’t understood what the plan is, but

apparently we’ve understood that there is no plan at all, and

all this nonsense

— what I showed, with people being kept in a hostel,

people being kept in a dormitory — is happening against the backdrop of

the fact that I posted — and I was

the first to post —

an order from the head of the Moscow Department of Health,

Aleksei (Alexei) Khripun, and in it

it simply says that, actually,

people who are sick with

coronavirus, but are not in serious condition,

are now being sent home. The order exists — please show it.

Can we take a look at this

order? Here it is. So, in order to keep

hospitals from being overcrowded, people are

told — doctors tell them — to sign

a voluntary consent form, a refusal of

hospitalization under outpatient conditions,

and that’s it. And this sick person, a person with coronavirus,

goes home — whether they take him there or

however it happens — in theory he is supposed to

self-isolate. He shouldn’t be out and about, but

the fact is that they are sending people home from the hospital.

So then why are we keeping healthy people locked up?

Or people whose status is unknown — healthy or not healthy?

You do a test — look outside or in

the metro, people are riding around, and we don’t understand

whether they’re healthy or sick, but they look

exactly like these students; outwardly they seem fine,

no one is dragging them anywhere, while we send sick people

home. And one of the most monstrous stories

that happened in this regard is about

this woman. When they sent me

— a small digression here — when they sent me

the order, which in general

looks reasonable, and hospitals shouldn’t

necessarily keep everyone

who is asymptomatic or almost asymptomatic.

Doctors wrote to me: “Alexei, look,”

“they’ve created this arrangement. It looks

reasonable, but under that cover they’ll simply

do this: an elderly woman is lying there, she’s sick, and

a doctor comes up to her. Naturally, she’s afraid of him,

she’ll do whatever he says. He says,

‘Ma’am, sign this voluntary

consent form. We’re sending you home.’ Great, right?

‘Doctor, home?’ — ‘Yes, yes, yes…’

And she’s been lying there for three days,

‘What procedures have they done for you?’

She says, ‘None.’ Well then, basically,

that’s it — right, let’s send you home.’

So they just send her home like that,

simply in order to

shift responsibility off themselves.

And when I suggested this, many

officials were outraged: ‘How can you

even suggest such a thing?’

And then this one video showed how such cases

lead to absolutely monstrous

situations. People like this are then transported

by what they call a ‘social taxi’.

So, they’re in the hospital with coronavirus,

in the hospital.

A doctor comes up and says, ‘Want to go home? Then go,’ and

this social taxi picks up several people

and drives them around.

And we all saw the video. Let’s

watch it — I’ll comment off

camera — showing how this social taxi

arrives, and they help a woman out. The woman —

there was no one at home for her.

A common situation: she’s in the hospital,

her relatives weren’t expecting her. They take

this woman by the arm — she’s clearly in bad shape — and sit her down on

a bench. As you can see, she’s really

feeling pretty awful.

But apparently, according to them, everything is fine. You can see the exchange:

‘Everything’s fine.’ And then she lies down, lies down on

the bench. Hardly normal. And this happened, I think,

not long ago.

It was cold, and a woman doesn’t lie down outside in the cold

on a bench because she’s enjoying life

or feeling well. But

it all ended with the taxi

driving away, and the woman died. She had just been discharged from

the hospital, and she died.

It’s unclear whether this mattered, but in

that same taxi

there was also a woman named Olga Gracheva.

She is a high-ranking Moscow

official. Later, the media outlet *Baza* reported

on this and established that when

they were sending several people

home to recover, this

senior official was among them.

It’s hard to say for sure, but here she is,

you can see her here, circled.

Naturally, she very much wanted

to go home, and this social taxi didn’t stop.

But honestly, in general,

they had no right to take out of

that taxi a person who was in such bad shape

that she lay down on a bench. If you see

a person collapse onto

a bench, what do you do? You call an ambulance.

They didn’t call one — they put her on a bench,

and then took the official on home. But

again, we don’t know whether she said, ‘You see,

take me home, let her die,’ or whether, on the contrary,

she said something else. Maybe it had nothing to do with her at all.

Maybe none of this happened because of her. But nevertheless,

the fact remains a fact.

I’m simply saying this to show

that on the one hand, they catch someone,

drag them somewhere, take them away, lock them up in some

dormitory, while on the other hand: ‘Oh, you’re sick,

you’ve got coronavirus, you’re having trouble, ma’am,

breathing? Well, lie down on the bench, have a rest,

for a bit, maybe they’ll let you go in a moment,’

and she died. And who was punished for that?

No one was held accountable for it—they just discharged her.

And now the doctor says, “Well, look…”

After all, she signed voluntary consent.

Not everyone signs voluntary consent, though.

People do sign voluntary consent forms, you know.

You were in the hospital yourself—it doesn’t matter whether you’re there...

an elderly person who is afraid of doctors

or a young person who

well, the point is, a doctor in a hospital is

a doctor, yes, and he carries that kind of authority.

...just lie there and then go home.

That’s it, he went home and died on a bench.

There’s a piece of paper saying that you refused

hospitalization—there, everything is in order, and that’s it.

I mean, this is truly an absolutely monstrous

situation that shows the chaos and

irresponsibility. No one has been punished.

What, did someone resign? Did anyone apologize?

To whom, exactly, is this investigation even accountable?

Did they jail anyone? But of course it’s unclear

who could even be jailed for this.

What do you do about it? Well, this is how it happens.

And this is just the case that happened to be caught on

video.

And there was a female official there, so it became

a huge scandal. But can you imagine

how many people are simply discharged, and then

they die somewhere, and they say, well,

“cardiovascular failure,” or

“her kidneys failed,” you know, or there was

cancer, and so she died of cancer.

“We have nothing to do with it.” Well, of course.

It’s just that against the background of the cancer,

her lungs failed, yes. There are so many different

questions. Alex asks me—my name is Alexei now,

There’s a lot of news right now about the purchase of grenades and

other weapons by the National Guard (Rosgvardiya, Russia’s internal security force).

Please share your thoughts on this news.

Well, this whole story was actually dug up by

a member of our RosPil project team (an anti-corruption project focused on public procurement).

He really did publish the procurement notice.

The National Guard is buying them, and it’s actually written there as

“combat offensive grenades.”

Some number of units—

I’m afraid to get it wrong—worth around 70 million rubles (about US$750,000 at current rates).

So, that means tens of thousands of grenades.

So why does the National Guard need them?

Still, the National Guard used to be

the Internal Troops; they have various kinds of

weapons. But why grenades? After all, we do have

an army—a very, very large army—that has

a great many grenades already.

It shows their priorities, doesn’t it? They have no money

for anything—we can’t buy masks for people—but

grenades, those we absolutely have to buy right now.

Of course, they’re not going to start tomorrow

throwing these grenades at you just because you’re

going to the store, but in general, of course...

Putin and Zolotov (Viktor Zolotov, head of the National Guard) clearly think

they really do view the National Guard as

their own punitive guard,

needed to suppress the population

when the population is, quite justifiably,

driven to the brink—when people are

already howling in despair. They seem to think

people have forgotten about General Zolotov. Should we

be afraid or not? Well, they should be afraid of grenades,

so they bought 67 million rubles’ worth,

and they think: we’ll just bomb everything, no problem.

That’s really how they think. And again, this is about

priorities, you see. If

they—even as was said at the beginning of

the program, as Pozner said at the start

of the broadcast—I showed you a clip

where he says to us:

“Come on, in this difficult time

let’s close ranks and support the government.”

Fine—but then let the government not

buy grenades right now. If they really, really

want to buy grenades, let them buy them

in three months, please. But right now,

maybe they could buy medical masks and

hand them out? No, they don’t do that. But

grenades—those, of course, must be purchased.

So, Tracy asks me:

Sberbank has moved on to COVID testing—what do you

think about that? I’m not sure I understand the question.

Is Sberbank doing it for everyone who wants it, or for its own

employees? In any case, when it comes to testing,

I’m all for it. I believe that right now everyone

should be doing a great deal of testing.

It’s the most important strategy, and so far

our state still hasn’t properly declared it as such.

It needs to be done. There are a lot of questions and

complaints.

In connection with my livestream yesterday, let me

explain myself.

Ninety thousand people are watching us live right now.

You can see the button here that says

“Become a sponsor,” a friend of our channel, and

you can subscribe and support us with

the money this all runs on. Yesterday I

did a kind of closed livestream that

at its peak was watched by 320 people, and overall

about 2,000 people can watch it.

And this livestream could be watched by

sponsors at levels 2, 3, and 4. I saw a lot of

comments like, “Alexei, have you

completely lost it? What do you mean

by ‘elite Navalny news,’

an ‘elite livestream’? I’m subscribed, I

share links, I’m fully committed,

I volunteer, but I can’t give money,”

“and now there are some special broadcasts for the privileged?”

Guys, it’s very simple.

Do you want me to do

advertising collaborations or

some other things? This is a big

YouTube channel. Our main YouTube channel

with videos is even bigger. We could make a lot

of money if I came on here and said,

‘Putin is a scoundrel, and by the way,’

‘this program is brought to you

in partnership with Rosneft,’

‘please use Rosneft gas stations.’

We do not do advertising, and you

can be absolutely sure that

I never take a single kopek from anyone.

No donations of any kind, whether

sponsorships or anything else, and we do not

take money from anyone. We are not dependent on anyone.

But this is, in a way, a kind of

compromise, and the understanding is this:

we say that we will not take anything from anyone,

we will just do our job well,

but then, well, give us something

so that we can buy cameras and pay

salaries to people and rent an office. That is why

we have these subscriptions, and within

the subscription model I will do private

streams, not very often, and these

private streams

are not, you know, some place where

I will supposedly make some kind of news there

or produce more interesting news

or share insider information.

The only “inside scoop” there was

that I explained how I

was recording and showed a short video

of myself recording under a blanket

at home, making a segment for a video, for, for

the little ones that we will discuss today. So

it is more of a conversation with those who are

so invested in promoting our

channel that they subscribed, and it is very important for us

to get some feedback from you. Well,

it is hard to gather feedback from hundreds of thousands of people,

so this is more like a group

of people discussing how to further

develop YouTube, how to further develop

the channel. I answer questions there, and this

really is, I mean, something we want

to do as a nice thing for everyone. We work for everyone,

but people also support us

financially, and we want to do something

extra nice for them. There are many

tools for this in the West; over there

politicians raise money by

having dinner with someone. For us, that sounds

a bit strange, you know, that you can buy a dinner with

Navalny (Alexei Navalny, Russian opposition politician).

But we really did seriously consider

something like that, and probably still are considering it.

If money is needed, we will probably

do things like that — send postcards, some kind of

I do not know, and little ducks float across the screen here,

so there will probably be some way to get

more ducks. These are just tokens of attention. We do not have any

exclusive information,

though of course it is very important for us to additionally

talk with people who have

a somewhat higher level of involvement.

But please do not worry about

the idea that I somehow have

news for the rich and news for those

who do not pay. When it comes to

politics, everything here is absolutely the same for everyone.

The only division is in the

organizational side: some people are more

immersed and involved, while others are less

immersed and involved. But that is normal; that is how it

will be. Returning to the point: 91,000 people are

watching Kafer.

As for the idea that we supposedly have no right

to criticize our state and that we must

rally together — this is now being implemented in a rather

interesting way, probably.

The loudest case that happened over the

past week involved a footballer.

I do not think they will be happy to hear

this at the Samara football club, the club

Krylia Sovetov ("Wings of the Soviets," a Russian football club).

But their goalkeeper, Yevgeny Frolov, he is

a decent guy. He gave an interview, and in

that interview he said things that, I think,

the whole country is saying right now — basically,

what our government is doing,

is it helping anyone? No, it is helping no one.

It is not helping. In general,

it was a harmless interview. He did not say that

Putin is a thief, he did not say that

Sechin (Igor Sechin, head of Rosneft) should be hanged, and he did not say that they all

should be arrested. He simply said

the most obvious things,

the things that are on everyone’s mind. Let us

listen. One minute and five seconds: “There is no

coronavirus for them.

They are making us stay at home, while there is absolutely no

help from the state at all, and

on top of that they are fining all of us for it. They do not care about the people.

They need us like serfs, like a labor

force — serfdom, call it whatever you want,”

not “Christian law.”

To clarify: serfdom. “The authorities simply do not give a damn about you,

they will just brush you off and say, ‘Guys,

there is no money, but hang in there’ (a well-known phrase associated with former Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev). They have money for everything

for themselves; for ordinary people there is

nothing. Look at the rest of the world — America,

Europe — many, many countries are really

helping their citizens, helping them

financially. Here in Russia, none of that exists.

What the president says on television

is all empty talk. There are no real

actions at all.”

And where is he wrong? Where is even a single word of falsehood here?

It is the truth: they are giving us absolutely no money.

It is all very strange — serfdom,

really. For them there is no coronavirus;

they run around here and there, and whatever rules

of self-isolation they are not following. They are giving us nothing.

He said it exactly as it is.

Right now, together with him, tens of

millions of people are saying the same thing along with Yevgeny Frolov.

So his club watched

this video, or someone watched it and

snitched on him, came and said:

can you imagine, he went out there and

said that our government

is doing nothing, and that President Putin

is speaking empty words.

And they did not even hesitate — they have now announced

that they are outraged. The club’s management

declared its disagreement with the athlete

and highly praised the support from the

country’s leadership, and said that he

would be punished. Punished for what?

testimony, I mean, you can see it right here

how cunningly and, I would say, how quickly

this censorship tool works in general.

This is absolutely illegal, and yet they

are publicly saying that they will commit, with regard to

our goalkeeper, something absolutely

illegal that they have no right

to do under any circumstances, because he

simply expressed his rather

neutral political opinion, and they will

punish him because they want to curry favor.

And all of this is being said with some kind of

official, state-like air, with all these

regalia, and of course, what did I do?

I immediately went to look up who

owns Krylia Sovetov (a Russian football club; literally "Wings of the Soviets"). Of course,

it belongs to the region.

It belongs to the oblast (regional government), and it is run by it.

This club was allocated money from the budget, and from

the overall federal budget, it receives

1.6 billion rubles a year, while 1.3 billion rubles are provided by the region.

That is, this club gets up to 80

percent of its funding from the people—

from the budget. In other words, from the very people whom

the goalkeeper Frolov was, in fact, standing up for.

And from those people

they first collected 2 billion rubles,

and then

gave it to this club, and now the management

is punishing a guy who said just two

words. And what's more, I immediately

looked into it. Fine, the goalkeeper—but the Accounts Chamber

audited this club's budget and

said that the club's low level of achievement

and its instability indicate

the inefficiency of budget investments in

the club's development.

That's from the Accounts Chamber report. So

the official picture looks like this:

there are talentless crooks from the

regional government of Samara Oblast (a federal region in Russia)

who received billions and are doing a very

poor job of managing them,

and on top of that they go after their own goalkeeper and punish

him. In other words, these people are basically—

the Accounts Chamber says that they

are making ineffective budget

investments—they ought to be hiding under

the bed and keeping quiet, because the Accounts Chamber

already nailed them on this. But no, they

have to crawl out of their own hole

and punish their goalkeeper. And of course, once

these first crooks crawled out,

then, from somewhere in the depths of United Russia (the ruling political party),

there emerged the very embodiment of

United Russia in power, in all its

stupidity, all its idiocy, all this

mockery of the Russian

parliament—and that is, of course,

State Duma deputy Nikolai

Valuev. He is the man who writes

our laws. So this deputy came out and

uttered, in a tone of great dignity,

the following phrase: "Maybe Frolov wanted

to cite other countries as examples where they don't do things

like this. But in what sunny country of

Lumumba—damn it—do they not act this way?

Then he shouldn't go off to Lumumba and live

a free life there.

"To eat at breakneck speed and not pay...

Let him find some country that's so free

in every respect and go live there,

wherever and however he wants." You see? So now

Nikolai Valuev is going to tell everyone

how we should live. Why—

why should Frolov

have to go off to "Lumumba"?

What's more, first he has to pay the salaries

of Valuev and his colleagues,

who are simply complete idiots and thieves.

First we have to pay all of them, we

have to keep funding this club inefficiently,

and then Nikolai Valuev comes along and says,

"Go off to Lumumba if you don't like

something here." What Lumumba? We already

live in "Lumumba" because of Nikolai Valuev and

this United Russia—they have turned our

country into a Third World country where there is no

rule of law, where people in power are just empty

words, as Frolov said, where people sit in office

who don't know how to do anything. That is

the real giant "Lumumba."

It is, in fact, pretending that

it isn't. Damn it, good Lord, I studied at

Patrice Lumumba University (the former Soviet name for RUDN University), and separately I should say

this is rather offensive, and he was actually quite a

cool guy, by the way. I mean,

but for Valuev—he understands

nothing—so for him

"Lumumba" is this kind of

insulting epithet. We are dealing with

a kind of "Lumumba" that has disguised itself

as a supposedly very great country,

because of course here we have

held a parade, we will hold a parade, we

handed out ribbons, we're very great—go off

to another country. But those other countries

are places like Germany, which

is paying money; the United States, which is paying

$1,200 to each person right now;

the United Kingdom; Japan, which is paying

money; South Korea, which did an excellent job

of beating the coronavirus epidemic—those are

not any kind of "Lumumba." We are the ones living in "Lumumba," but apparently we

are supposed, you understand, to give way to people like

Nikolai Valuev.

Smart Voting—how did we elect him?

Why should he be a deputy? That is

the task for everyone, plain and simple:

to make sure that this very stupid man, who

cannot be a deputy, who

understands absolutely nothing—he may have been

some great boxer, fine, great,

let him be a boxer, excellent, Nikolai Valuev,

we'll give you another medal, and maybe

10 or 30 more medals,

you were great—but what are you doing in the

State Duma if you can't even

To speak, not to write, not to think—why there?

to be located, but is located, and the whole team is all on

minutes

So, within the framework of Smart Voting,

we have to push him out of there; he shouldn’t be there

He shouldn’t be there, and so it will be

very frustrating. What can you do—he’ll run in the

single-member district, and again they’ll

of course clear the field, remove all

the competitors, and push him through again, and he’ll

just sit there like this, looking on

I really don’t understand what’s going on, but once

a year he spouts some nonsense about how

if someone doesn’t like that I’m sitting here

sitting here

then go from here to Lumumba (a reference to Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow), because they

supposedly have support. They have no support

at all. They have nothing except

the falsification of these elections. It’s very

important. Let me take a couple of questions.

to your mister chit in both of your

sir—this is, this is, this is a person’s name

to your mister... anyway, a question about

Vladimir Solovyov—will he be allowed tomorrow

to leave the country, because

departure is being allowed for all holders of residence permits, and we

will miss Vladimir Solovyov

Indeed, the government has adopted

a decision under which it now allows

people to leave Russia if they have a residence

permit. Vladimir Solovyov, as well as his whole

family, as is well known, hold

residence permits in Italy, and they

really can go there now; everything is already

fine there now, better, easier

He can get off our backs and head to Lake Como, and from there

they’ll lecture us again from there

telling us that we should

go to Lumumba (Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow). Generation of the ’90s asks:

Please comment on the mosaic with Putin and

other “saints” in the Armed Forces Cathedral

By the way, that cathedral was built where

I spent most of my life, in that

military settlement, the village of Kalininets

though everywhere they call it Alabino there

They built that Patriot Park nearby on the

training ground, and this structure is of gigantic

proportions—a cathedral, and in a place where

no one is going to go. People wrote to me

several times, and believers there

came up to me and said, “Alexei, you just

don’t understand the problem with this cathedral. Actually,

the Russian Orthodox Church seems rich, but

at the grassroots level, people live very

poorly because there’s never enough money for anyone

ever. And the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, for example,

is a huge structure; it devours enormous

budgets, and is basically maintained

by the city, but nevertheless

huge sums go into its upkeep, and there in

Alabino they built—you just can’t imagine what

what kind of

scale of structure. And in a place where

there are no parishioners—there are no parishioners there, no

communities. You can hold some kind of

ceremonial events there, probably herd in

soldiers so they can pretend that

they’re praying. But in itself, what

is happening is the height of idiocy, and

of course those mosaics with Putin, Spo

lonsky, whoever else—well, what is there

to comment on? These people, they’re

building a little cult of personality

They sat down and commissioned all of this because

they wanted to immortalize themselves for the ages. I don’t

think they’ll succeed, but that is

exactly what they were aiming for. Like, here we are

with our mugs here—this is God’s

temple

Probably even a different government

would be embarrassed to chip us out of there. No,

it won’t be embarrassed—someday, believe me,

a different government, of course. But then this

this is simply, truly

blasphemy and mockery of God’s

temple. Dmitry Ushakov asks:

There’s enough material for one program a week

and it’s becoming a lot—maybe it’s time

to go on air twice a week? You wouldn’t

manage twice a week

It would be hard for me, yes. The thing is that

there really is so much

happening. I’ve already been live for an hour now

and the script has only gotten through about

one third. If we do it twice a

week—well, twice a week

it’ll come out to two and a half hours each. Well, I

actually have thought about it, but

in the end I thought that probably twice a

week would be too much. I’m being

told that we already have 6,000

sponsors—that is, six thousand people

who clicked the button and

joined us and became the people

who, well, support our channel

to a greater extent. I urge everyone

to click those buttons, including so that later

you can watch my

streams, Sobol’s streams, and everyone else’s, where

we just sort of keep discussing things further

and develop the channel. A lot of questions are about

a strange news story, a strange story

that came out of Ust-Kut, where supposedly

at first they wrote that local residents, some men,

caught and beat up officials who

wanted to set the forest on fire

This is probably exactly that

rare case where some

news happened and, honestly, I still

don’t understand what happened. I mean, I’ll

tell you about it, but I don’t have

any clear opinion because

the whole thing looks rather strange. At first

they said that some men caught and beat up

officials who wanted to set the forest on fire

then they said that one of the officials

caught and beat up the other officials

who allegedly wanted to set the forest on fire, and then

They say the mayor of Ust-Kut caught

some other people from his own city administration and

beat them up on his own territory because

they were allegedly trying to set the forest on fire. Let's

watch the video, 53 seconds.

Here are three canisters of gasoline too, yes, I believe that.

So, on April 28, at around five o'clock

in the evening, a boat arrived at the agricultural lands

at Kamni and they tried to set fire not to the forest nearby

Yekaterina Anisimova, all together

a handsome guy from Kyiv was there too

they were caught red-handed.

All of this sounds strange and

well, I mean, the first version of the story is

that some guys caught them and beat them up,

while they were trying to set the forest on fire.

That seemed understandable, because back in 2010,

if I remember correctly, forests were burning across

the whole country.

That was when the well-known incident happened with

State Duma deputy Burmatov,

who was a representative of the youth wing

of United Russia (the ruling political party), and he was caught because

they would go out somewhere as volunteers

supposedly to put out forest fires, but they were actually looking for

a real fire—they wanted one badly enough.

So they would drive up, set the forest on fire, then supposedly

take photos of themselves putting it out, and

leave. They were caught doing that and exposed.

It was a big scandal. Burmatov

basically disappeared somewhere for several years,

hid under the bed, and now he's crawled back out again

and is giving a lot of comments.

He's a typical United Russia man, but still

old-timers remember that, so at first I

thought this was the same kind of story. Then

it turned out they were all officials there.

So as for what happened in Ust-Kut,

I'm flooded with questions. The answer is: I don't know what

happened there. Some kind of

very strange story took place. Maybe

local residents listening can shed some light on it.

I see a question from Vlad Dolnikov.

It's signed right there, Dolnikov. He's asking me

a question in this vein: Alexei,

do you get a pass for trips to the

dacha and for going out onto the street in general?

Why is it a loaded question? Because Vlad

is a very good person who helps us

a lot all the time. He's in IT, and

he also has a fairly large Telegram channel,

and he's a principled opponent of these

passes and urges people not to use them

because they're not legal. I also

think this is illegal. Today, a big

comment on this was given by our head of legal,

the former head of the legal department,

our lawyer Ivan Zhdanov.

He explains there why all these

penalties for

[music]

for the fact that, say, you go outside and

the police stop you somewhere—are absolutely

illegal. All these police reports are illegal.

But I can say this: I traveled a couple of days

ago, and I did get a pass, because, well, in

my situation, it's just that I

am under a certain level of monitoring,

so if I don't get a pass,

then basically I just won't be able to get anywhere.

I absolutely consider all of this illegal. I

absolutely think this is a gigantic,

meaningless scam

by the Moscow city government.

But still, I can't unequivocally tell everyone,

guys, don't get a pass,

fight with the cops when they stop you.

I can't say that to everyone, because

in the end, the person will get fined. This is exactly

the kind of situation in which

some of us

are forced to comply with certain

illegal, humiliating rules, well,

because they are forced to—say,

because they simply need to go somewhere,

so I got a pass. But I

completely share Vladislav's opinion

that this is absolutely not

legal.

Spooky Vans writes: Alexei, if this stream

lasts less than two and a half hours,

we'll organize a DoS attack. No need

to organize one, because judging by

it, this stream won't be very short either.

Excellent question. Ksenia Kuznetsova: Alexei,

hello. Russia has allocated 10

million to fight locusts in Africa.

How would you comment on that?

There really was news about this, which of course

infuriated everyone, because the United Nations

through its Twitter account

cheerfully announced that Russia

had joined the global initiative

to fight locusts in Africa and had allocated 10

million dollars, and of course everyone was

furious.

They're allocating money to Africa, but not to us.

The thing is, of course money should be allocated,

because it's a major problem in Africa,

and not only in Africa—with global

warming, we could end up with

the same problem too, so this is something

that needs to be addressed. But the outrage is understandable, because

sure, 10 million dollars for Africa

is not a lot of money for a useful cause, but

then give something to your own citizens too.

That's exactly the point. The whole thing is that 10

million is a laughably small amount for the

state, but at the same time it's important money—

for an entire city, even several cities,

you could distribute masks for free

and buy a huge number of ventilators

with that money. But it wouldn't even occur to us

to compare these things if they were actually

helping their own citizens

and spending money on them. So

overall, I think those 10 million dollars should have been spent on

something useful at home.

this matters, and it matters for all of humanity, but

in this particular situation, it looks

offensive, because we can’t even

buy something as basic as boots for our hospital staff

for medical workers for a whole month,

for more than a month—almost two months—I’ve been showing you every day

videos of some kind of

ruined, destroyed hospitals, and

here we are sending $10 million somewhere

to help Italy, from the U.S., and everything

else—this is just absolutely

absurd. So sign the Five Steps

petition. You see, it keeps popping up endlessly

right here on the screen, and it will

keep appearing—I just want you

to sign it. There was a question here: my

parents are afraid. They fully support

the Five Steps program, but they’re afraid

to sign it because they’re afraid

It’s striking how badly everyone has been intimidated, if

people are genuinely afraid to put their names

on online petitions because

their surname will appear under some kind of

anti-government text. That’s

of course quite a remarkable shift in our

collective mindset, because, my God,

it’s such a harmless thing—not going to a rally,

just signing a petition online, not

that I’m criticizing anyone—I’m simply talking about

how quickly and how severely

the state is degrading. Every one of us has probably thought

about Stalin-era times (the period of Joseph Stalin’s rule in the USSR),

or about what is happening now

in North Korea, when we see

those wild videos where there’s this

still-alive, current Kim Jong-un, and

before him all the other

rulers, and people run after them, cry,

write things down in little notebooks, and we watch

and laugh, thinking: how did people come to this? But

that’s exactly how. Look how quickly it

happens. It seemed like everything was still

normal not so long ago, and now already

someone gets punished for criticism on the internet,

even the goalkeeper of Krylia Sovetov (a Russian football club) was

penalized, fined for

saying something completely harmless.

These people are being kept in dormitories, and in general

we’re already afraid just to sign a petition

online, and tomorrow we’ll be afraid of something else

too. That’s exactly how it works.

So there’s no need to be afraid. Explain to your parents

that this is absolutely

safe. Nothing will happen. But the most

important thing is: they’re still politicians,

they’re not monsters who’ll all suddenly start trembling

and fainting—but that’s what happens with us

all the time, you understand. This

entire government is really just a tiny

cockroach; tomorrow nothing will be left of it.

They will do whatever we

say, if we truly

demand it. Realize your own power. And yes,

they won’t literally tremble and faint—well, specifically

not the people watching these broadcasts, but the whole country

as a whole, yes. And that is our

biggest problem. Still, we can see

how the rhetoric is changing radically. The protest

in Yakutia (a republic in Russia’s Far East) that took place this

week was very telling. I think

whether to show you this video or not

—it’s 1 minute 40 seconds long, and it contains a lot of

profanity. We tried to

bleep it out, because otherwise we would have had to bleep half

the video. But it’s simply an excellent example of how

things have changed at these regional

protests. The rhetoric there—at the Kondinskoye

field, I think it belongs to Gazprom,

it’s an oil field, and there are

a lot of shift workers there.

And it all turned into an outbreak hotspot.

Naturally, there was basically no protective equipment.

People started getting sick; some of them were

taken away, and accordingly everyone was told that

they were under quarantine. And as so often happens,

as it often does in Russia, under

quarantine they were confined, but the living

conditions were bad, they were fed poorly, and these people

had come there to do

very hard work for very good

pay, obviously, and they want

to be fed properly. But the authorities do not

degrade in parts—they degrade all at once.

It’s systemic. Even all these state

corporations understand that

since the people have no rights and you’re the powerful one,

the state can do whatever

it wants, and a state company can also do

more or less whatever it wants, including

in particular

not feeding its workers properly. Then there was a protest.

And if earlier protests of this kind

used to be, you know, in the format of

well, not exactly ‘let’s get down on our

knees before Vladimir Putin’—although

there was some of that too—but they

were more like: let’s

appeal to the authorities, let’s

call on them somehow, and they would appeal: Vladimir

Vladimirovich (Putin’s patronymic), but here the rhetoric was completely

different. Let’s listen to this 40-

They herded us all together

with all kinds of infected people, didn’t they?

[music]

[applause]

[music]

[applause]

[laughter]

with you.

There are 10,000 people working there, and a huge

number are infected. Everyone there has now

been tested, but the results of those tests

still aren’t available.

And all of this is continuing, and that’s why it is

important.

Although it’s a rather strange video recording:

Gazprom workers just ran around swearing at the bosses,

and people applauded—well, it’s clear that

They were talking about these... and about how they...

They were talking about this government, and somehow...

In a word, they were reacting sharply even to the word “president,” well...

even...

They can’t even pay them properly, and neither can they pay us...

Oil workers on shift duty—good Lord—they have always...

been paid huge sums, and even there they can’t...

they can’t even pay properly, I mean...

organize some kind of system. This is not...

I don’t know—some kind of separate isolation there, or...

something like that. Nothing is happening, and this...

conflict is escalating. Today I saw...

a video showing that they had already blocked the roads and were not...

letting vehicles through to the work site. Let’s...

watch 22 seconds. “We’re striking over pay, we...”},{

are on strike, we’ve blocked the roads, they’re not letting...

our people...

[music]

I keep saying that things like this...

are extremely important, because when people say...

People often write to me asking, “When will it all begin?”

Guys, it will all start with strikes. Everything...

will start with strikes. It will all start with...

trade unions, when people like this at these...

oil and gas fields—when they finally come out and...

block things off—what are you going to do to them then? Well, let...

them try. What can you do? Now they’ll start...

stalling / stringing people along...

They’ll probably open a criminal case against someone...

but overall that will not solve the problem, it won’t...

solve anything. And when people start coming out...

and production stops, then...

this regime will start falling apart piece by piece. And it is very...

important to support people like this at these...

work sites, because, well, if...

I’ll repeat: if those who sit on top of the oil wealth...

in the richest company cannot...

whatever they’re shouting about there—tape or whatever—can’t even provide...

decent food and cannot provide them with...

proper testing conditions, then what should...

everyone else expect? By the way...

in Murmansk...

Did you know that in Murmansk, at a specific...

Novatek facility...

since...

Mikhelson has several times been the...

richest man in Russia—a billionaire...

a billionaire among billionaires, really, absolutely...

on a massive scale—and their facility in...

Murmansk Region has now become one...

of the biggest infection clusters there. I think...

it’s 3,200—if I’m giving you the exact figure...

Well, that is, according to official data there...

more than 800 people are infected; in reality...

it’s much more. Let’s take a look. So...

why did the outbreak happen?

Because, as usual, everything was concentrated in one place...

while the cops were running around catching people somewhere else...

and there they were creating huge lines, but...

at the work site there was no such thing as social distancing...

so people were infecting one another...

This is what that queue looked like. Let’s watch 26...

seconds.

[music]

world...

and his speech...

frames...

and here we are, still working...

So, as usual...

they made them stand in lines, and then...

it turned out that hundreds of people there...

were infected. They said, “Okay, hundreds of people...

are infected.” Then the governor...

came out and said, “There will be a quarantine. We are introducing...

a quarantine. Everyone goes home.” Naturally, everyone...

could see that there was no quarantine at all. Here’s a video...

29 seconds long, showing that everyone could calmly...

go into the city of Murmansk or anywhere else...

Let’s watch. Look, a bus has just pulled up...

the bus brought them in. You see, not a single mask...

on anyone. Look how many people there are...

I can’t count them, I don’t even know how many— they...

just keep coming and coming and coming and coming...

So much for self-isolation—the management...

is allowing them to move around like this through the settlement...

They’re simply brought here by bus, and they...

just do this...

stock up on groceries and all sorts of things...

And now there are about a thousand infected there according to...

official data; according to unofficial reports...

in particular, lists were passed to our штаб (campaign office/headquarters)...

by locals who work there, showing nearly...

3,000 infected. But at least according to...

the information coming in, no one really...

knows. No one really knows...

how to deal with this, what to do with...

these workers. And this is Novatek...

whose owner has billions—many...

many billions of dollars, which...

he earned to become one of the very...

richest people—and this is what is happening to his...

workers. So I’m simply...

calling on you, guys, to strike. It’s clear that, well...

it may seem impossible, but it...

is actually easy if you show...

a little persistence, because the whole history...

of strikes—I’ve said this many times—is not...

just the story of the last ten years, but...

20 years—really, the analyzed history...

of strikes over 150 years shows that people always...

achieve their goals. Wherever you...

work, call for strikes...

and strike against any...

injustice. If you show...

some persistence, and your comrades do not...

sell you out in the first five minutes, and you...

manage to agree among yourselves, then you will almost certainly...

win, because there is nothing they can do to you...

they can’t do anything. And now, let me ask...

Dmitry Taratuta.

Alexei, what is your attitude toward the low...

level of trust in Putin—28%, according to some forecasts?

Well, it is obvious that his rating is falling, and...

they’re not giving people money, people are suffering, and so...

now they have this idea—just as Peskov said—that...

in a month and a half we will all forget about this...

and we’ll just go back to...

dealing with whatever difficulties there are...

We had faced difficulties before.

That is exactly what they are counting on—that it will simply

now all the restrictions will be lifted, and they will stop

talking about it, stop recording people

as being sick.

And then, after some time, supposedly

people will muddle through, and everything will settle down.

Their ratings will start going back up. That is very important,

because they have elections in September, and they

do not want you and me to crush them

through Smart Voting. Besides, they also have

that vote on

the Constitution, which they are going to shove down our throats.

And, well, they will simply compensate, as usual,

by making sure there is a very

very strong and very

blatant lie about how everyone supports Putin,

about what a wonderful leader Putin is.

As Posner said again at the very

beginning of our program, everyone who is against it

is supposedly going against the absolute majority. We are

still going to be told that

those who love Putin are the absolute

majority. That is no longer true at all—not

online, not offline. It is simply not

true, and it is very important for you and me to understand that.

That is why pressure through the network is needed.

First of all, there are a great many questions

about what is happening in the courts. Second, it is important simply

to talk about it, because there was a

rally there.

That rally was broken up in a very underhanded

way, and now people there—well, there

are basically three things happening there

that we need to pay attention to. On the one

hand, they are repressing the local

population. As a result, five people received

administrative arrests.

They are already fabricating charges under

the hooliganism statute; two people were detained supposedly for

alleged hooligan actions. In other words,

as usual, several thousand

people came out, and the entire republic supports

them, but everyone is sitting and waiting to see what

will happen next. After that, our authorities and the Investigative

Committee simply arrest random people

just so that, once again,

like a cockroach scaring animals,

the animals will tremble and faint

from fear. They just grabbed several people,

arrested them, dragged them off somewhere, and that was that.

Oh my God, they arrested him, so tomorrow

they will arrest me too—and so everyone stays silent.

Although if everyone demanded it, tomorrow they would

release them all, as we have actually

seen happen several times before, though not with such

targeted repression.

But there is something remarkable there, and

I am always criticizing the police, but there

is a great, honest police officer there who

even spoke out publicly. He said that he

would not take part in beating down his own

people. In other words, he is a decent

guy.

They fired him. What can you do—this is a police force that

what does the police do?

Its purpose is to protect villains from good

people. They fired him. He even recorded a

video address in which he thanked people for

their support. Good for him. So

someone like that should be supported. Let us

watch his address now—it is a minute and a half

long.

Well done, young man. "Greetings to you, kind

people.

I have always believed that in our vast

country there are many kind, responsive, and

compassionate people, and now, from my own

experience, I am convinced of it. I am receiving

a great many messages and

calls asking me to post my bank details

and give sincere

people the opportunity to help me financially. Please do not take

my refusal as rudeness.

I do not see any urgent need for money, and

there are no hopeless situations. If I had

been chasing money, if money had

mattered more to me than anything else, then I

would have stayed on the sidelines and next year

received a housing certificate worth

4 million rubles or more, but

money is nothing—here today, gone tomorrow,

whereas honor and dignity stay with us

always.

And after death, I want to stand before

my ancestors

with my head held high. There is only

one thing I would ask of you:

pray for my family.

That is far more valuable, and my gratitude

will know no bounds. Thank you sincerely,

thank you for your compassion, for your understanding, for

your support."

Well, you see—a decent, honest person.

He worked in the police, and then

he refused. He said, yes, I am not going to disperse

my own people. How could I beat them?

For what? My neighbor is right—am I supposed

to beat him, and have someone drag him away?

He refused. So what, did they destroy him? No, they fired him.

That was his choice. If everyone there had refused,

and written letters, and there had been a collective

appeal, no one would have been fired.

Nothing terrible happened to him, but it means

he was fired alone, and they just crushed him

and devoured him.

On the contrary, everyone loves him. He is a good

person. I hope everything will be

all right for him. In any case, he is a

respected man in the republic. As for those

who carried out the dispersal—they are ashamed, but they sit

at home and tell each other, well,

if it had not been us, they would have found others.

And they come up with a million other justifications

for their own meanness and cowardice. But every one of

them

envies this normal,

free, honest man.

holds its head high, and therefore

Police officers, you do not have to be

enemies of your own people. The authorities turn

you into enemies of your own people, but you do not

have to become them.

And if you stand against this en masse,

then there will be nothing they can do to you,

absolutely nothing. Well, as for the network—

they brought in the Rostov OMON (special riot police), and just as

in Rostov, it should refuse, because

after that they will bring in Ossetian units to Rostov, and

that is exactly how the whole system is arranged. It needs

to be said plainly: but what for, if they are

there smashing something or breaking windows, okay, then we

will disperse them or detain

someone. But if they have simply gathered there,

for some kind of rally—well, they do have the right

to hold it, and they have every right

to hold their peaceful rally. It is obvious

that if people are being shot at that rally,

then we stand there, and we absolutely do not

have to carry out unlawful orders. That is

bound to happen sooner or later, but

I would like it to happen sooner.

Then the third thing that happened in

Ossetia was absolutely

outrageous: the local

Rospotrebnadzor (Russia’s consumer safety watchdog) — just as an example of how

a good person, a good son of his

people—what a disgrace for the Republic of Ossetia,

for all Ossetians. This regional office of

Rospotrebnadzor in North Ossetia

recorded an increase in coronavirus cases

and explained it by saying that there had been

a rally against all these measures,

against the quarantine. Amazing—so that is how you can

explain it. Well, perhaps, perhaps

someone even got infected at that rally, but

then why does Rospotrebnadzor also tell us

at the same time that dozens and hundreds

of similar gatherings that took place in

the metro—let’s watch 29 seconds of how

it looked when they were locking

people in the metro, and they stood there for several tens of

minutes waiting to be let inside. 20

seconds.

electronic

So this—when people are standing somewhere in an

enclosed space, in the view, in the

official view of Rospotrebnadzor,

did not affect the spread of

coronavirus in any way at all. But when

someone went out to protest in Ossetia

in the open air, of course that led to

terrible illness. I mean, it is simply

total, absolute hypocrisy.

Dmitry Kharitonov: Alexei, give us your

comment on the latest film about Yuri

Dud and Dolina. An excellent film, three

hours long—longer than this broadcast. I wanted

to discuss it with you in detail, maybe

in the next broadcast.

But I will not spoil it for those who have not yet

seen it. Watch it—it is a very good

film. There is some kind of critical

discussion there about why it did not show more women,

why there were so few women, but it is a very interesting and

very good film. I watched it with great

interest.

One good acquaintance of mine appears in it.

It is definitely worth discussing, so

thank you for the suggestion to discuss it in

the next program.

Bolee2367 asks whether there is any merch

from Navalny. Well, go to our store in May—

I think it is working now, yes,

and it delivers. Go there—we will put the link in

the description. A few questions about my TikTok:

but why do you need TikTok?

Alexei, please make TikToks. I

do not know why TikTok—well, I just

want, you know, not to fall behind and not

to turn into

that classic kind of person to whom

children bring phones and say, look,

and he is like, what is this, what does

this mean? But now

millions of people use it. I am not sure that

I will be recording much for TikTok,

and I am definitely not sure I will be making

musical videos where you have to do this

and that and show some kind of

responses.

But it is an important means of communication, yes.

TikTok is bigger than YouTube now in terms of

download volume, so who the hell

knows—just in case.

Subscribe; the link is in the description.

Zikot asks me: Alexei, what do

you think will happen if after the May

holidays they lift the self-isolation regime? Will

the number of infections increase?

It looks more like genocide. Well, let us

talk about Putin, who made his

fourth address in this

fourth address.

Basically, in essence, he said

that we have made major breakthroughs in

industry, and that we will extend

this self-isolation, this quarantine, until May 11.

And it very much looks as though, judging by the fact that

everyone has already started saying that we are reaching

a plateau—and a plateau means the number of cases is not growing—

the point is how actively they are

lying about it. It looks like after

the May holidays they will lift the quarantine, I

believe.

And I am not a virology specialist; I

simply listen to smart people who write

about this and who analyze both

our country’s experience and foreign experience. Foreign experience shows

that these quarantine measures are lifted

when there really is a clear plateau,

not when the number of cases is rising.

Here, we can see that, first of all, the number

of cases is growing very sharply; second,

they are clearly concealing the death toll, and they want

to lift these restrictive measures in order to

to defuse public discontent

people are stuck without money, so Putin's

overall concept, as I see it,

is basically this: to hell with it, let them

get sick if they must, and we'll just hide

these statistics

but we'll let them out of their homes and send them

to work, because otherwise they'll tear us apart

that's what they're afraid of, as far as I can tell

that's what's happening here, in this way, and now they

are now saying in the Moscow region

something like, we've reached a plateau, and quite

rightly, the doctors' union points out

yes, they say: show us. There's a tweet,

from Vasilyeva, and she quite rightly

wrote: what plateau are you talking about if in Podolsk

a children's hospital has been converted for all this

every day more and more

hospitals are being opened specifically for

coronavirus—what kind of plateau is that?

That means that according to the real statistics,

the number of cases is rising. In

Yekaterinburg, in the previous

program,

I told you—I was outraged that a hospice there

had been turned over for coronavirus, and now they've

also given over the main maternity hospital. There isn't

anywhere else to handle complicated births there.

There are 128 pregnant women there on

bed rest to preserve their pregnancies, and they're handing it over for

coronavirus. Does that look like a plateau? No,

it doesn't look like a plateau. It looks like

active growth. And just now, literally

before the broadcast,

Moscow's deputy mayor said this strange

phrase. She said: we urge all

Muscovites to stay home or go to

their dacha (country house), literally. And those who can,

if possible, go to your dacha. That's really

sending mixed signals, let's say, and

as for the fact that people will head out en masse

to their dachas,

I don't know, but I think they were simply

trying to hide all this for now. But anyway,

getting back to Putin, let's listen

to this statement of his that everything

is being extended until May 12. 46 seconds.

Putin: On April 2, I signed a decree under which

the days through April 30

inclusive were declared non-working. In

this connection, the following

decisions have now been made. First, we have a series of

major May holidays ahead of us. Between them

are working days: the 6th, 7th, and 8th.

We know that

under normal circumstances many people would not work,

but would take time off or vacation days.

And now, all the more so, we cannot take risks.

Therefore, I consider it right to declare these

three days non-working, with

pay preserved. Thus, taking into account

all the May holidays, the period of non-working

days will last through May 11 inclusive.

See what a scam that is? Like, I'm

announcing—well, you know, we've already spent a month

not working, and now I'm extending it for you

by another three days

but that actually means until May 11, so that's another

month and a half. Just say it plainly:

we are imposing quarantine until mid-May. We've

already been under quarantine for a month, and we need

to stay under it a bit longer. But if you just say

it like it is, everyone will say, good job,

he finally said it straight. But then

you'd have to give people something, you'd have to pay

and they are panic-stricken about doing that. Today

Maxim Mironov, a fairly well-known economist,

published a great article.

He explains a question many people ask:

why don't they want to give out money? Because

that would also be beneficial, and every country

is doing it—only Russia isn't, even though

it has very large reserves. Because

they are really

saving all that enormous money for the oligarchs.

They will hand it out to them, and you'll see—it

will happen very soon. The fall in

oil prices

has already led to 300 million being given recently, and they'll give more.

It's just that all these huge companies where

Putin's cronies are sitting

are carrying out massive investment projects,

and on those projects, Putin himself profits,

personally, as do his family and his

inner circle. And those investment projects have

driven the companies into huge losses

and debt, and they want to cover all of that

with our reserve funds, and

that's why they're spouting all this nonsense.

For me—probably like for you too—but what specifically

really pissed me off, honestly, was that for the fourth time

the man addresses the nation and he was late.

How late was he? Three and a

half hours. Three and a half. Which

raises the question: when the president is addressing

the nation during an epidemic, and you delay it by

three and a half hours—what more important business

could you possibly have? What is it—eating cottage cheese with honey,

swimming in the pool? What's going on?

What's more important—chatting with girls, telling them jokes?

Telling stories at some government meeting?

There cannot be anything more important for the

president of a country

than addressing the nation. Fine, if

there was something super-mega important,

and you absolutely had to swim two more

laps, or I don't know, do something like that,

okay—but how long could that take?

Be 15 minutes late, 20 minutes late,

but on every

single address he was late by more than

an hour.

And this time he was three and a half hours late—what was happening there?

It shows total contempt,

you understand? I mean, just imagine

if I were late to this broadcast by three

hours—you'd think, what is he, an idiot or something?

Is he sick? But I'm the one doing this broadcast here, and you

Watch it voluntarily, I'm running late.

A live broadcast, you say? Well, I probably won't.

watch Navalny anymore, because, well...

If I went on air and didn't explain

where I'd been — like, at the police station for three hours —

that would be understandable. But if I just said, well, so what,

what did you expect, let them wait,

whatever — 94,000 people are watching

live right away, they'll be watching.

You know, I'm just so great.

And I'm telling such great

jokes here on YouTube, and telling

the blunt truth — so it shouldn't make no difference to them.

They've got nowhere to go anyway. So I might think of it that way, or

put it like this, or show it all, and

tomorrow I'll have 4,000

watching live instead of 40,000 or 94,000, and

it's just astonishing that they do this to

the whole country — they seriously

think: whatever. More than that,

quite the opposite.

The idea is that this somehow makes us more valuable,

that people will love us more because of it,

because they'll understand how much

above everyone else we are, how much cooler we are, that we can just

show up for an address to the nation

four hours late. Why?

Fine, if he'd come out and

delivered some kind of amazing address,

like, I don't know, laid out

how we're supporting people, that we have this kind of

medical plan, we've got this, we've got that,

we've really

done everything brilliantly. But he came out and

said, basically, for three days I'm introducing... we, we

produced this many masks, and before we

were producing 60 ventilators, and now

we're producing 600, and we'll

be producing 700. What a

breakthrough, right? The epidemic started in January,

and by February-March it was already clear

to everyone. First of all, we've now

admitted that, it turns out, an entire

huge country with a population of 147

million people wasn't producing any

ventilators at all, and we've finally started

producing them. We had this clip about

the great economic breakthroughs.

Let's watch it. No, we don't have that clip.

They're telling me we don't have that clip with

the great... I mean, who among you watched it?

I mean, no — nothing was said.

Absolutely nothing. And in substance, nothing

that would justify postponing it by

four hours. I saw, I think, on

TikTok.

There was a very funny video on TikTok

that parodied this

address by Putin.

With a man not wearing pants — and it really

perfectly captures all the government's proposals,

because if you just

sit down right now and honestly ask yourself:

what exactly has the government, over these two

months — and Putin over these two months —

during all this quarantine time, what measures

has it proposed and implemented?

And if you sit and think, you'll come up with something like:

none. That we should self-isolate,

that we should do this ourselves, do that ourselves,

and that's exactly what this video shows.

Let's watch.

Hello everyone, you're watching the news on

Borodaty ("The Bearded One").

Breaking news from the government

of the Russian Federation: a plan has been developed to

combat coronavirus. Healthy people

are advised to isolate themselves; sick people,

to cure themselves; students, to educate themselves;

the unemployed, to provide for themselves; the hungry,

to feed themselves; the dead, to bury themselves. And those who are unhappy are advised to

just

shut themselves up.

That's all the news for today.

That really is exactly

what they offered us: just do everything

yourselves. Just somehow manage it all yourselves.

Figure it out yourselves — but at the same time Putin is

great, and now they really just

despite the fact that, as I already told you,

the United Nations

recognized that we're basically sitting at a

very bad place in terms of preparedness.

We have a complete failure across the board,

absolutely everywhere. I mean, I literally have

a bunch of videos in my script that

show that there is absolutely nothing,

no protective equipment at all. More than that,

right now doctors are being persecuted for

saying that they aren't being given

protective gear. Remember I showed you a woman

from the town of Kalach-on-Don, a doctor

named Tatyana Deryoma.

Her video got a huge number of views

on VKontakte and everywhere else, because

she simply came out and on video

showed that they had absolutely nothing.

What happened next? An inspection followed.

The Investigative Committee came to check

it, and as a result they issued her three

disciplinary

penalties in a row, and now the Investigative Committee is conducting an inquiry there.

Let's listen.

One second — what? We don't have the video?

Sorry, please — the problem with live broadcasting

from home: it's in the script, but in reality

it's not there. All right. So, the doctor who

spoke out — you saw it here, I showed it in my

program — she complained,

and the very next day they immediately sent

an inspection from the local committee,

which is mainly going after her,

because, well, because you can't

admit it — you have to punish someone and prove

that Putin is the greatest. And of course

the head of Bashkortostan (a republic in Russia), Khabirov, spoke in a truly remarkable way.

Khabirov of Bashkiria (Bashkortostan) — yes, that very same Khabirov

who...

in the republic, but simply one of the most

obvious outright failures—a center

of infection, and this is an absolute fool and

a thief sitting there, and he also

a useless thief, usually rolling up his sleeves, sleeves

a high-ranking official

from the Presidential Administration, he

naturally, when there were major scandals

around Ufa, Ufa fins afinskaya

the Republican Hospital, which became

a hotspot of infection, his response was to say that

he was holding the first online summit

Russia–Eurasia, naturally hiring all

the bought-off crooks; Sobchak came to this

summit

to talk with him about what a

wonderful, magnificent Vladimir Putin is

and the man comes out and publicly says

that, actually, you know, here we have

we’re so lucky, we have such a low

fatality rate

it’s thanks to the mobilization of our

institutions around a strong leader

Vladimir Putin. Let’s listen, check this

human society after the pandemic

there will still be a desire for stability

social stability, political

and economic stability, and I dare to suggest

that our country, which is fairly

well organized, has quite successfully

organized the work to prevent the spread

of the pandemic, and by many indicators is

showing very good numbers, for example

the COVID fatality rate

is capable of implementing these measures in many

ways thanks to the fact that we have a very

high degree of efficiency and

manageability, and the fact that we have all

united under the leadership of a very strong

leader, our national leader

the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin—this is

a very serious fact, in my view

that we also need to think about

if there was a Vladimir

Vladimirovich Putin factor, it consisted in the fact

that there is simply a global failure there, in

particular in Bashkiria (Bashkortostan) there is simply a failure

but in reality the hospital became a hotspot

of infection, and they began hiding all of it

they shut the hospital down, the doctors there, how should I put it,

it all started coming out, and the Investigative Committee began

opening criminal cases against those who

were talking about it; there was an appeal there

from half the hospitals in Bashkiria (Bashkortostan) saying there was no

protective equipment, nothing at all, and today these

doctors—already several dozen people there

just imagine, this is Bashkiria (Bashkortostan), where generally

everything is tightly controlled, where traditionally people

are afraid of the authorities, and people, so to speak,

don’t usually show off or push back against the authorities

where the voting level, where

the falsification is always 84 percent—the doctors

of the Republican Hospital recorded a 6-

minute appeal in which they describe

how terrible everything is

one moment, let’s watch a clip from it: Hello,

I am an employee of the Institute of Traumatology and

Orthopedics named after Vreden, and today is the 26th

of April

I am at the institute, in quarantine. Since the 6th

of April, all staff and patients

have been inside the institute

the staff have all already been sick; a large

part of the staff were sent to hospitals

some to Botkin Hospital, some to Hospital No. 40. We are taking

coronavirus tests; I personally have taken them

five times already

not a single result has come back, and I’m sitting here and

I can’t understand whether I’m infected or not

infected

the doctors aren’t examining us because there’s no one

to do it

there is no treatment at all, neither for the staff nor for

the patients, because we are an institute of

traumatology; we don’t have the medicines, we

aren’t being treated with anything—basically, holy water

staff members who already have pneumonia

are being falsely marked and sent through regular sick leave

even though they got sick at the workplace

while in quarantine. Our

management tells us nothing about anything

they say nothing. On the 9th, all of my

management was taken away, that is, the senior

department head, two excellent doctors

and an orderly were taken, and then everything went wrong

please forgive me, this video is

actually a video with mixed-up labels; I’m honestly

confused among the videos of suffering doctors; this

video is not from Ufa

from that Republican Hospital. If

you have that video, please play it for us

if not, well, you can find it for me on

social media

I apologize for the slight mess

well, it’s

of course connected with our, our complicated

situation—I’m working remotely today, but the point is

find the video and watch it, there

for a full 6 minutes doctors are speaking, doctors

from the main Republican Hospital in Ufa

are appealing to the whole world; there are appeals to

the Investigative Committee

the Prosecutor General’s Office, President

Putin, and I don’t know, UNESCO, to everyone—where

they say that everything is monstrous

there is horrific infection across the entire republic

everything is very, very bad, and the head

of the republic at the same time comes out and

feeds everyone nonsense, saying, you know,

everything is so good here, and of course that’s because

of the wonderful role of Vladimir

Vladimirovich Putin, and this is, as it were, their

number one measure now in fighting the coronavirus

virus: to lie about how wonderfully

Putin is doing everything. And measure number two—

well, that is, they kept thinking what else

they could do in order to

show that they are fighting the coronavirus

the virus, but at the same time not paying for anything

paying, and it was obvious visually, I don't

they're now introducing a mask mandate, and as

usually happens here in Russia, you know

at first they were showing and explaining everywhere

that no masks were needed

that all of this was nonsense, and now they are in

a huge number of regions, but here I was

here in the script, when I was preparing

today it mentioned Primorye (a region in Russia's Far East) and it mentioned

Tatarstan (a republic within Russia); by the start of the broadcast, already a large

number of regions, and by this evening we

by evening, the Moscow Region had already announced: everyone

must wear masks; whoever doesn't wear a mask

will be detained by the police. The question is: where

are people supposed to get masks? I mean, we're not even asking

the next question yet: why should we

pay for masks? But even if we're ready

to pay, where do we get them? There are no masks in

pharmacies, no gloves, and none of the other stuff either

there's no sanitizer. I mean, in some places you can

buy them, but most of the time you can't buy decent masks

at all

I'm helping the Doctors' Alliance collect

money, and their main problem is

yes, you donate money, and with that money

they buy protective equipment for doctors

the main problem is that the money exists

but buying proper

personal protective equipment is impossible, even

ordinary masks are unavailable, and now the regions

are introducing all this, and in Primorye (a region in Russia's Far East) they've introduced

it, and local people there are writing to our штаб (campaign office)

there are no masks; in Vladivostok, there are no masks in pharmacies

none. In the Moscow Region and in Tatarstan they've introduced

a mask mandate, and what did they do right away? Not

use Tatarstan's huge budget

to give everyone masks. Not even, like I showed you

here in the video from

the Madrid metro: there were

police officers there, and for everyone coming out they took out

and handed them a mask, and people either went

wearing masks, or put one on, or took one

because you'd need a spare mask too

you need to change it every

three hours. But what is happening

in Tatarstan? Of course, they need to send in

cops who will walk around

the store and catch those who violated the rules

and are walking around without masks. Let's watch

the video for a minute, I hope it's there

our

hours not for recovery, you didn't come in

to break apart

with yourself

why not insert it with lubricant now

you'll have to come with us

[music]

young man

well, here we are again, a month later, and we've

already seen what seemed like idiocy

that couldn't be topped, when people with

dogs out for a walk were being detained. And here

they've introduced a mask mandate, and a cop deliberately

goes into a store

to hunt for someone, even gets in his face

and says something like, "Hey man, you're without a

mask." He says, "Yeah, I'm without a mask," and then

"if you're without a mask, you'll infect

someone" — "Will I infect someone?" — "No, you need to

come with us to the station." For what? So that at the station you can

give him a mask? I'm practically

falling apart here, I'm getting tongue-tied — what is

this for? It's idiocy. A whole bunch of cops, and

one of them is actually running after him, you understand?

The guy is taking off — just give him a mask! You're a wealthy

Tatarstan; if these masks exist, buy them

from the pharmacies and hand them out to people. When I

when all this was just beginning — and

remember, I put out a video about how Moscow

bought masks for 400 million rubles (about US$4.3 million)

I made a video about how they bought them

at an enormous price, inflated several

times over, but still, they bought

millions of masks. Where are those millions of masks?

Why aren't they being handed out for free somewhere?

No, no — you can't buy them for money either, but still

it's the same thing, well, if

if they assume that people now in all

regions are supposed to walk the streets in

masks, under a mask mandate, then that means everything

should be overflowing with the cheapest,

simplest masks — but they don't have them

So now what, we're supposed to make them out of paper

and attach elastic bands?

Meanwhile, a police officer is running around already catching someone, but

this is simply outrageous — it's abuse

of citizens. And then there's this whole

discussion about whether it's necessary to introduce

a state of emergency

Navalny is calling for giving everyone

money and declaring a state of emergency

but they say that's not necessary, because that would mean

there would be police all over the streets — and

what the hell is this now, then? Seriously, here we have

no quarantine, no state of emergency

nothing at all, really

no actual legal framework for any of this

and yet, in reality, cops are running after

people in the street because they aren't wearing masks

and under what law, exactly? I mean

at this point I'm not even discussing

that it contradicts common sense

the detention of these people. The president

of the Republic of Tatarstan

to whom we'll bring at least a clip

of this video — why are you engaging in this idiotic

nonsense? You have the money; this is

not that much money to give everyone, regardless

of the size of the republic's population

Tatarstan, you can afford

to buy these masks and give them to people. If you

can't buy them and hand them out, then say so — say that

we can't buy them because there aren't

enough of them. Then where are people supposed to get them?

If there aren't enough masks, where are they supposed to get them?

If they introduce a mask mandate in Moscow now

there will be a huge number of people, at least in masks, well

Look, in Moscow you’ve got this strict regime in place — where are the masks?

Where are people in the Moscow region supposed to get these masks?

There are 5 million people living there, that’s all.

Summer cottage residents (dacha owners) are asking: where are we supposed to get these masks? There aren’t any.

There are no masks, but they introduced the mask regime and the cops went out.

They started finding people and fining them, that’s what’s happening.

I’ve been saying since the very start of the broadcast: there is no—

there’s no strategy at all, I mean none.

No kind of plan whatsoever, just some kind of—

[ __ ] someone was sitting there saying, let’s do something like this—

something that makes everyone think we’re fighting it.

A mask mandate has been introduced, and then everything will look—

visually right: people walking around in masks, comments saying—

they’ll go around checking: oh, you don’t have a pass?

They don’t just check a little — they check everything.

And that means they think even more needs to be checked.

Your mask — and now come with us to the police station.

This is just the absolute limit, instead of—

instead of grabbing a person without a mask and dragging them to—

the station, driving with them in a police car, taking them into—

the station, when right now a huge number of—

by the way, police officers have been infected, even—

my favorite 2nd Operational Regiment — the very same one

whose officers are always, for example, detaining me.

They keep hauling people in; they’ve got a lot of infections there in the lockup.

There’s a large number of infections there. I saw—

media headlines coming out saying that there were—

dozens of people there, maybe hundreds of people in—

that 2nd regiment. Well, of course — they’re all there in—

the barracks.

In those close quarters, obviously, they—

infected each other, and now everyone’s sick too.

And of course, the thing to do is grab some guy off the street and—

take him to the police station too.

Write up a report saying he isn’t wearing—

a mask. And this is actually happening.

And it’s happening because we, damn it—

even though the whole country is furious— but I—

even judging by these broadcasts of mine, for however long now—

we’ve been on air for almost two hours, and 97,000 people are watching.

I’ve never seen viewership like this for us—

on the channel right now, I mean never.

It’s exploding everywhere, everyone is watching—

trying to find at least some information.

Everyone is outraged, everyone is sitting online.

Everything is boiling over there — well, then it needs to boil over—

against the government. People need to write to it,

to this president of Tatarstan (head of the Republic of Tatarstan), saying:

“Man, damn it, give us masks for free or—”

or else—

otherwise United Russia gets zero votes, zero.

Sure, you’ll falsify the results, obviously, and so on.

But if normally you falsify from—

a real support level of 30 percent—

and then add another 30 percent for United Russia—

another 30 percent — now you’ll be adding from—

from zero, because not a single—

vote until you buy us masks. That’s how it should be demanded.

That’s what people need to demand. They just need to write about it—

write about it everywhere, just say it—

be outraged, persuade your grandmother, and this—

won’t pass completely without a trace, because—

I assure you, the authorities are very, very—

sensitive.

They feel public opinion. Now we’ll move on—

after almost two hours on air — to the—

women’s marathon. It turned out kind of funny for us—

that by the end of the program—

I specifically waited until more—

viewers had gathered online, because I’ve got—

Sobchak, Putin’s “daughter,” Todorenko, Maria—

Zakharova — really interesting topics.

Topics I really want to discuss, actually.

Even Todorenko — it may seem like—

not all that political—

not political events, not the kind of events—

that I usually—

discuss on the program, but they’re very important.

And all of this, basically, happened because—

all these wonderful women—

said some things on the internet.

And it’s very much worth discussing, because—

it reflects the whole country. And we should start—

of course, we should begin with—

Ksenia Sobchak.

who has now become our queen of—

crabs, and that was a very strange piece of news.

Because at first I didn’t pay any attention to it at all.