Navalny at 20:18. November 30

[music]

Hello, Moscow. It’s 8:18 p.m., which means that in the

Navalny LIVE studio, it’s Alexei Navalny

— or “dimwit,” as I was called today by

Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev,

the prime minister of our country. And really, he could

have said, strictly speaking, “that

Alexei Navalny, you know, that kind of

dimwit,” but he didn’t — he just said

“dimwit.” And once again, some kind of

irrational fear of pronouncing

last names kept him from doing

that. So I’m simply “dimwit.” “Dimwit”

gets added to the long list of names and

nicknames they’ve given me: that

“gentleman with two criminal convictions,”

“an incredible person,” “dimwit.” But today

I’ve thrown down a challenge, and on this broadcast I’m going to

compete. We’ll discuss the “dimwit” some more, but

the main goal of my stream today is

to beat another person — someone much

smarter, and much more likable to me — but

I still want to beat him. That

person is Leonid Volkov, who yesterday on

his stream was testing a donation

collection system live. And

look in the description of this video right

now — go there.

You’ll see a link. That link is the

live-stream donation system, and

Volkov yesterday — look at him bragging in the

photo — raffled off a mug yesterday,

a mug, and raised 45,000 rubles (about $500), then

came in all proud and said, “I raised 45

thousand rubles without really doing

anything, just during my stream. And if you

consider yourself a candidate for

president, you should bring in 10 times

more. And if you don’t, then I should

run for president instead of you.”

We can’t allow that, guys. We

love Volkov, but we can’t

let that happen. So besides the fact that I’ll

answer your questions today, I’d like

to raise

450,000 rubles (about $5,000). Go in and donate. But

you’re not just sending money off into nowhere — on

our screen we have a wonderful scrolling

ticker.

If you donate more than 50 rubles (about $0.50),

your name appears. And if you donate

not 1,999 rubles — in full accordance with

all the rules of marketing, AvtoVAZ-style (Russia’s largest carmaker) — then even a question,

a remark, or an insulting comment

about me will appear right on the screen.

A large number of viewers will read it all,

and let me answer the question right away:

“Alexei, you’re running for president, so

do you really want to be doing this kind of

nonsense?”

Collecting donations live on air?

The answer is yes, I do, because it’s very

important to me that everyone understands where I get

the money for my campaign. Yes,

I ask you for it, including during

live streams, and with me everything is clear. Please go

and find out how

the campaigns of

the other candidates are financed. Well, strictly speaking,

they aren’t really campaigning, but whatever it is

they do,

you’ll never find out where they get

the money for it. My campaign is completely

transparent, and as of today

we have raised

232 million rubles (about $2.6 million) through your

donations. The median donation is

500 rubles (about $5), meaning tens of thousands of people

have sent 500 rubles each. With

that money, for a year now we’ve been running

the only real election campaign in

Russia, and I’d say quite effectively.

If today I raise during this stream

450,000 rubles (about $5,000), I’ll increase our campaign

budget by 0.2 percent, and I’ll be

absolutely happy. I’m doing my part in

raising donations. So yes, candidates

should do this. Besides that, there’s another important point:

we really want YouTube

to help independent video bloggers and

independent journalists

earn money, especially those who work

in the regions, and we’re testing these

donation systems on political content:

a talking head sits there, talks about

politics, and somehow raises money. We

want to tell people in the regions that

you can try this too, guys:

get involved in politics, tell the truth, and also

collect donations — cover your

expenses, maybe even earn

a modest salary.

There, I can see the first likes and donations

starting to come in. Follow the link and

there’s a fairly tedious system there, that

registration process — tedious for some people, not

for others. Yesterday someone donated 850

rubles (about $9) to Volkov. She’d be a fool — she’d now be 850

rubles behind in our competition. But

it can be done. And to motivate you even more,

I didn’t come empty-handed.

Volkov already yesterday

was raffling off

a mug. I’m going to beat him. I need to

raise more. Look, here I have

a prize for third place. So here’s me

announcing a contest: whoever donates the most

money.

The person who ends up in third place

will get this mug — absolutely

wonderful. It’s not paper, not like

this one of mine — it’s

ceramic. If you run into Dmitry

Medvedev and he calls you a dimwit, you

can hit him with this ceramic

mug — it would hurt quite a bit. We also have

this cool bag — that’s for second place,

for whoever comes in second place in

in the donation drive, and there’s this

very popular sweatshirt

sweatshirt. You may remember that once, on this

broadcast, I was wearing an eye patch like a pirate, and

to commemorate that, my brother Oleg

drew this print for the sweatshirt, and it

turned out to be quite popular, by the way.

There was a pretty funny moment: I came in and

asked which print was the most popular

that people buy most often in our online

store, and they told me, well, this one

with the one-eyed guy. I said, what kind of

designer came up with that? They said, well, it was Oleg

who drew it. I said, what a great new

designer Oleg is — he draws these kinds of

things. They said in the design department, we can

introduce you — he’s actually your brother.

Oleg is sitting in prison and drawing things like that

there.

Anyway, follow the link below and

send donations. Down below, at the bottom

of the screen, you can see a progress bar that

shows how much we’ve managed to raise

— or haven’t raised — of the 450,000 rubles (about $4,900). If we don’t

reach it, I’ll have to endure mockery

from Leonid Volkov for a long time.

So, I’ve gotten a hundred thousand million

questions about why YouTube

has stopped liking us and what YouTube is doing to

us. Yesterday there was a whole news story

about how, in some mobile phone apps,

in search,

“Navalny”

couldn’t be found; if you searched for “FBK” (Anti-Corruption Foundation),

it was impossible

to find anything. Even by the word

“Cactus,” nothing could be found. Then

it turned out that “Meduza,” “Dozhd” (an independent Russian TV channel), and various

other names of opposition

media resources were apparently blocked. The company

YouTube acknowledged that there was such a problem, although

at first everyone accused us of paranoia.

It said that it would even

rework the Android app,

the YouTube app for Android, but apparently

they already have.

Some people say the situation has improved,

others say it hasn’t been fixed.

There’s nothing we can do about it — this is

something YouTube itself is doing. I’m mentioning it to draw

attention to it, but overall I want to say that

we are, of course, seeing clear and major

active efforts by the Kremlin to

break YouTube. They really dislike broadcasts

of this kind, which probably

can’t yet compare with television, but at

least already exceed a significant number of

radio stations in terms of listeners and viewers.

a significant number of radio stations.

And our main YouTube channel, where we

post videos, has already

surpassed most

TV programs in reach. They don’t

like that, and in general they are trying to break and distort

YouTube for everyone. They’ve done this

before — they did it with LiveJournal

a few years ago — and now we can see they’ve

brought in some specialists who

understand the algorithms: how to push things to the top and

how to flood us with dislikes, how

to keep us from trending, and

how to block various search

queries. They’re going to keep doing it. So what

can be done? There’s one response: give us

likes.

Send money, send

links to all your friends and acquaintances. We need

to treat this calmly. It’s obvious

that they’re fighting back because

they’re protecting their wealth.

So then, about the “moron” — let’s

watch a short one-minute

video in which Dmitry Medvedev

answers a question from a correspondent

from Dozhd TV, Mikhail Fishman, and I

of course want to ask whether you’d

like to add anything to that?

No, I said everything when

I characterized everything that was done there

during one of my interviews. I have no other

comments. There’s nothing

comment on that.

The more you comment on all sorts of

chatterboxes and crooks, the better it is for them.

That’s exactly what they’re counting on.

Well, really now,

Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev, please tell us:

how can you

comment on the situation in which

you were accused of taking multi-billion-ruble bribes

and tens of thousands of people across the country

came out several times to protest against

you and against the fact that this investigation

was so easily dismissed? I don’t want to

comment on that.

The remarkable thing about our authorities is that they

really do, unfortunately for now, have

the ability to despise us so much, to

disrespect us so deeply, and to care so little

about our opinion, that once again, live on air, instead of even

trying to say something like,

you know, ‘We are concerned that the public is

concerned,’ or

‘the prosecutor’s office reviewed the investigation

and found nothing,’ they don’t

even say that.

They simply say: we do not consider it necessary

to comment on the investigation of some moron.

They think they’re very tough, but I

am sure that this kind of behavior by

Medvedev will bring this government a great

deal of trouble, because this

thing — I know this for certain — infuriates

all my supporters, my opponents,

everyone, really, because what Medvedev said

was

not about corruption, not about anything else.

It was about contempt.

For a large part of the population, this is about...

This is a declaration that we are separate, and...

some kind of people entirely apart.

But overall,

that long Medvedev interview

of course demonstrated, first of all,

that this man is a complete nonentity.

He lied outrageously on air

about rising household incomes, I mean,

Compared with the other things he said, calling Navalny an idiot

was probably the least

nonsensical part, because Medvedev, in all seriousness,

stated that economic

growth and real household incomes are once again

on the rise. If only he went to a rally somewhere,

with me, I’d like to see

what people would tell him about real

household incomes. Alexei, a fundamental

question here: what do you

prefer, DC or Marvel? Still,

I’d go with Marvel.

The DC films are kind of

crazy overall. I’m for Marvel.

As of right now, we’ve raised

if I’m seeing this correctly,

48,000 rubles. We need ten times more,

ten times more. Remember, Leonid Volkov

is laughing, looking at us, cracking up,

and smugly scratching his face. If we don’t raise

during today’s broadcast

450,000 rubles. A reminder: the prizes

are great, great prizes await you. I’d like

to answer.

Besides answering you, the main

response is important to give to two people. Person

number one is Olga, whom I

spoke with at a rally in Nizhny Novgorod.

Person number two is

Alfred Koch, a well-known public official

from the 1990s, now someone

who writes fairly interesting, sharp,

op-ed-style posts

on Facebook, harshly criticizing the authorities.

A criminal case was fabricated against him;

he is not allowed into the country. And Olga—

after the rally, I came down from the stage

and a pleasant woman was shouting,

“Alexei, Alexei, come here, I have an important question.”

I came over, and she said, “Hello, please explain

to me clearly and plainly what I’m supposed

to do on election day.

Who am I supposed to vote for

at the polling station if they don’t allow you, Alexei, to run?”

Koch writes the same thing. He published

something like an appeal, an open letter,

more or less saying:

“Alexei Navalny,

you’re a good guy, a great guy, you’ve already

convinced us of that. But now let’s just, without

any nonsense, without jokes,

without anything else, explain what we

are supposed to do at the polling station

on voting day

if they don’t let you run.” As for Alfred,

to Koch and to Olga,

so here’s the idea: Alfred, Olga, what are you

going to do at the polling station

if I’m not allowed to take part in this election?

What exactly are you going there for? Why do you need

that polling station? What are you, pagans?

Is this for you

some kind of pagan ritual that once every four years

you must come and pray to a god

hidden somewhere inside

the ballot box?

Do you absolutely have to go there and buy

the little pies sold

at polling stations on election day? What

could there possibly be there

if there is no actual election? So, friends,

let’s understand this very clearly,

let’s realize it: a polling station and

a ballot box have no

value in and of themselves. It is not

responsible civic

behavior, it is not the right

thing to do, simply to come once every four

years to some room and throw a piece of paper

into a box in that room. You go to a polling station

in order to make

your political choice,

to demonstrate your political

views, to influence the authorities by voting

for an opposition candidate,

or at least to inflict some kind of

political damage on this government. It should be

a conscious action that you take

at the polling station. If I am not

registered, what conscious action

can you take there? Spoil your ballot?

But that’s all nonsense. All strategies involving spoiled

ballots are never

mass movements. Elections are meant to support

candidates, that’s what they were designed for.

If you have a candidate, you go and vote

for them. That is why we value elections and

respect elections when there are

candidates. When there are no candidates,

there is nothing to do there. Someone says to me,

“Well, Lyosha (diminutive of Alexei), you’re wonderful, of course, but I can’t

not go vote. I’ve always gone to

elections. It’s the right thing to do. My

parents taught me that if you’re a normal

person, you have to go vote.” But Olya (diminutive of Olga)

and Alfred, there is no election. The Kremlin is not stupid.

They understand perfectly well

what your concerns are. Koch wrote this in his post,

and Olga told me: “If I don’t

go, they’ll just write whatever they want on the ballots.

Putin, Kiriyenko, and Medvedev

are much more cunning.

They have devised a system in which

they don’t need to falsify whatever result they want;

instead, you will come and produce

the result they want. They have even rationalized

this process. Of course, I’m not the be-all and end-all,

I’m not trying to claim that,

you know, I’m somehow the only one.

candidate

if they don't let me run, then there's no need

to go. I'm not saying this applies

to all elections or to every situation in general,

but please tell me, in these

elections,

what other candidates are there who are actually

running a campaign, fighting

for votes, trying to change

the government, entering into

confrontation with it, doing what

a candidate is supposed to do? Good grief.

Three months before the election, not a single meeting with

voters is being held by anyone at all — not

the Communists, not A Just Russia, not Yabloko (a liberal Russian political party),

not anyone else. Putin hasn't even announced yet

that he's running. This is not an

election — it's a sham. So in these

particular elections, I doubt that you

can point to any candidate

who is actually running a real campaign.

There is no such candidate. I have no one

to support.

If there were another person with whom

I had some disagreements, but who overall

shared the same views as I do,

if he were running a campaign the way

I have for a year, if he were competing with me,

if he were fighting for voters' support,

then probably — I don't have any purely

selfish considerations that it has to be only me and

no one else.

I would say: don't vote for me,

vote for Kolya. Kolya worked his tail off for a year, Kolya

has shown his ability to run

an election campaign, we understand

where Kolya got the money for this election, he

is doing what we do,

maybe a little worse, but he's doing it.

But in these elections, is there anyone like that? Nicole &

Nicole — there is no one like that whom you could

support. There simply isn't. So, dear

Alfred Koch and dear Olga, what you

can usefully do right now is

first,

send us a few rubles as a donation,

and second, come to these

elections

if, in accordance with the law, I am

registered for them; campaign actively,

bring the maximum possible number of

people to the polling station.

But if I'm not registered, then there's no need

to come and pray to the ballot box.

That funny GIF that just appeared on my

face means someone has sent

a fairly large donation. Don't

pray to the ballot box.

If the election has no meaning, my dear

Alfred and Olga — and for our new

viewers, let me remind you that I have an ongoing

internet battle with Leonid Volkov,

who was bragging that yesterday he raised 45,000

rubles and thinks I won't be able

to raise ten times more. So my

goal today is to raise 400,000 rubles.

The progress bar below shows it.

So, we've already raised 100,000 rubles.

Excellent — let's push a little harder.

And Leonid Volkov will be crying, crying on

the next broadcast, and I don't know, we'll make him

sing a song or something else

so that we can feel some kind of victory.

Alexei, in your videos you often

— Vitaly, people tell me — make slips of the tongue like

"when I become

president, I will have television" and

others in the same vein. Of course after that

you correct yourself, but there is a suspicion

that these slips are Freudian after all.

Vitaly, you are suspicious — these

slips are simply because people

do misspeak. If only you heard my

slips of the tongue on Saturday.

On Saturday I held two rallies in one day — the first was

in Vladimir, the second in Nizhny

Novgorod.

And already in Nizhny Novgorod I was

saying that I would cut spending on

education and healthcare,

saying things like, and when I

become mayor — all sorts of things like that.

People misspeak. For example, I often

say "I put corrupt officials behind bars"

as a rhetorical device,

and then of course I correct myself: I will send

corrupt officials to the defendants' bench. So, well, don't

suspect me of anything like that — there's nothing

of that sort going on, and Freud has nothing

to do with it. YouTube isn't showing me in

recommended live streams — your stream

used to be there, writes Yevgeny Selyanov. They

do the dislikes for exactly that reason. Why do you think

under every one of our videos this

Prigozhin's cook (a reference to Yevgeny Prigozhin, nicknamed "Putin's chef") and his wonderful

Ol'gino troll factory keep putting

huge numbers — tens of thousands — of

dislikes?

Not for fun. They understand how

the algorithm works, and we can see that

whereas before, in our traffic sources,

recommended videos used to be in

second place, now they're fourth or fifth. That

reduces the number of views. So in

that sense,

Prigozhin's, Putin's, Kiriyenko's (Sergei Kiriyenko, a senior Kremlin official) — I don't

know whose strategy else it is — it doesn't

mean I can say it has hit us terribly hard or

that it has radically reduced

the number of views, but about 20 percent

of our views they've taken away, which is fairly

painful.

The only way to fight this is for you

to keep giving likes yourselves. So,

I was saying that Olga and Alfred

Koch should look for a normal

candidate who is actually running an election

campaign, and if they can't find one, then on election day

these elections need to be actively

boycotted—not just by staying

at home, lying on the stove (a Russian idiom meaning doing nothing), but by making sure that

no one goes, so that it becomes improper, ah, well,

for participation in these elections itself to become unacceptable. And

that is because a normal

candidate, who is running a proper

election campaign—our

election campaign right now, I say this with

pride, and I want to thank all of you

because right now you are

sending money—121,000 rubles (about 121,000 RUB) have already

been raised since the start of this broadcast. We have a great

campaign; we are really running an excellent

campaign. Last week I had

meetings in Perm, in Vladimir, in

Nizhny Novgorod, and in Chelyabinsk—four meetings

in three days.

And all of them were—everything had to be done

through Moscow. That is a feature of

the logistics.

Logistics in Russia: every trip to the

eastern part of the country means that every time you have to

fly through Moscow, because it is impossible

to find flights that let you get from

Perm to Nizhny Novgorod, from Nizhny

Novgorod to Chelyabinsk. That is exactly why

it is so funny for me to hear all these various

little things that were just flying around

me—well, someone paid for those too, apparently, but

many thanks, they paid for more of them as well.

These little things fly around—that is how the market

economy works: any whim for your money.

Despite the fact that all the cities in the eastern part of

the country—and travel between them

is only possible through Moscow—nevertheless

we are holding huge, great rallies. In

Chelyabinsk there was an especially large

rally, in terrible cold. Once again,

dress warmly. And this shows once again

that our campaign is real, and

the Kremlin is not afraid of us for nothing, because

the Kremlin’s core belief is that

the opposition is just some people who exist

inside the Boulevard Ring (central Moscow); they have no real support, they

walk around in all sorts of, you know,

leopard-print coats, they ride around in

the mountains and valleys—hipsters with those little

cups. But far away out there

there is the plain, homespun Russia, and it is supposedly all for

Putin. It is not for Putin at all. I was

in Chelyabinsk.

Ordinary people come, and there are

so many of them that Putin could never

gather that many, and United Russia could never

bring together that many people—not in Perm, not in

Nizhny, not in Vladimir. So

we are running a great campaign, and we are demanding

consciously, and with every right, that our candidate be allowed

to take part in the election, because

we truly represent

more citizens than all

the other candidates put together. This

week—tomorrow, in fact—I am flying to

Saratov. Yes, we will have, on

December 1 at 6:00 p.m., in Heroes of Krasnodon Square,

a rally. Then I am going to Pskov,

then I am going to Samara. I will be in Samara

on Sunday. You might ask: what kind of fool

came up with a schedule where you are first in

Saratov, then fly to another part of the

country, and then come back to Samara?

Well, that is just how

our approval process works. We go where

there is an opportunity to go. For example, in

Samara we won a court case, and the court

ruled that they were obliged

to make the administration provide us with a venue

for holding this rally. Actually,

I was originally supposed to go to Kurgan on Sunday.

I apologize to the residents

of Kurgan—I will definitely get to you.

But since we won the court case, it would somehow have been

strange if we won the case and then did not

go hold the rally. So we urgently

changed our plans. Another

whole problem is—just imagine—that these are

two cities people always confuse: Saratov

and Samara.

And they are both in the same tour for me. Right now I

mean, my main concern, of course, is not this, but I

think the main thing is not to walk out on stage in

Saratov and shout, “Hello, Samara!” and

vice versa—that is, not to make

that classic mistake. But I hope

I will not do that. I also wanted to say

just two more words. In every

broadcast I talk a lot, yes,

about the pressure on our headquarters, but

the situation in Irkutsk shocked me. We

often have volunteers arrested, often

they are jailed for a few days

of administrative arrest. But in Irkutsk

we held a truly enormous rally,

the biggest in the entire history of

Irkutsk. We held it on the grounds

of a furniture center that was

made available to us

by a wonderful entrepreneur who was not

afraid to challenge this government. He

also, by the way, was given five days; he

served time. And they were so enraged by our

successful rally—I mean the local

authorities, the Kremlin, the governor, the mayor—that they

keep jailing people. And now they have

jailed one of ours for days—

Zakhar Sarapulov; he has gone on a hunger strike.

He is in jail right now. And here is this man’s biography:

he graduated from Moscow State University with honors,

speaks five foreign languages, and at the

same time works as a teacher in a village in

Buryatia. You see, this government

should be running after Zakhar and kissing his

feet, saying: “My goodness, what an

wonderful, selfless person you are.”

You went to this Buryat village

despite having graduated with honors and

despite speaking five foreign languages.”

You teach children foreign languages and other things, and in general,

you’ve basically devoted yourself to your own

you tied your fate to the development of other

people. But no — we’ll grab you and

lock you up for 5 days. For what? For the fact that

you simply organized a completely legal rally.

This is yet another example of how much

this government squanders talent,

how it treats people as disposable, how it despises people. And secondly,

how little it values the main thing that

actually brings money, success, and

prosperity these days — human capital,

intellectual capital.

They simply couldn’t care less about any of it.

The more of these smart alecks, bespectacled nerds, and

show-offs who got

top honors diplomas and speak different

languages — by the letter of their law, we’ll

throw them in jail for 5 days. That’ll make everything better, the Kremlin thinks.

And right now, in fact, our

election campaign is

a confrontation

between the educated class and these

ghouls, vampires, just fools,

some complete idiots who seized

the Kremlin and don’t know how to do anything,

never have and never will. So they’re

trying to crush those who want to and know

how to build the beautiful Russia of the future.

You’ve probably already seen the video we

released today on the main channel — it’s about

a gadget worth 10 billion rubles (about $170 million at the time).

It’s a perfect example of what this government can

achieve

without us. Let me just — oh, I’m being signaled here —

sorry, let me take this call.

We’re live right now, excuse me.

So, next up we have

Wylsacom Valentin — 5,000 rubles

has been transferred, and he is now the main

contender for this wonderful sweatshirt.

Stanislav also gave 5,000 rubles, so Wylsacom

and Stanislav are competing for our top

prizes, and Tatyana X

paid 3,333 rubles and is now in the running

for prize number three. Thank you so much, guys.

We still have time, we’re continuing

this fundraising livestream. We have a little

more than half an hour left. So far we’ve raised

161,000 rubles, and we need to raise 450,000.

Leonid Volkov is already standing behind this door,

laughing.

He’s looking at me and saying that now

I’m running for president — let’s put up a barrier

in his way. In the description to this video

there’s a link — go there and send

a donation to the election campaign.

And today we have to raise 450,000

rubles.

That’s 0.2% of our campaign budget.

If we don’t raise it, then rockets will

keep falling in Russia. The rocket

that launched this week

did get off the ground, but it failed

to place 19 satellites into

their planned orbit.

Those satellites fell into the Atlantic.

What’s more, they included foreign satellites as well as ours.

It’s a very sad thing, but under no

circumstances should we gloat

over the failures taking place

in the Russian space industry, unfortunately

on a constant basis lately, because this is

a failure not only for Russia, but a failure for

all humanity. When America

has a setback, when SpaceX

runs into trouble, that too is a problem for humanity

rather than just for Elon Musk or the United States. And the same goes for

our satellites: humanity

has lost a little ground, has stepped back a little

back

in its struggle for space. But what I wanted

to draw attention to, as the founder

of the Anti-Corruption Foundation,

which spent a huge amount of time monitoring

the construction of the Vostochny Cosmodrome,

this is exactly where the rockets were launched from.

We had a whole saga called

“Rogozin’s Tooth,” when

our foundation’s lawyer, Lyubov Sobol,

got into a real clash with

Dmitry Rogozin on Twitter, as our officials usually do.

On the screen now you can see

a fragment of her video.

You can find it — she made an investigation

into the Vostochny Cosmodrome.

We analyzed all

the state procurement contracts and can say with complete certainty

that it’s amazing not that rockets

are falling, because in this agency

run by Dmitry Rogozin there is simply

chaos.

The level of disorder is indescribable,

you can’t even imagine it. There at

the Vostochny Cosmodrome, for example,

deadlines were constantly pushed back. Rogozin

actually said that he would give up

his tooth if the deadlines slipped.

They slipped several times. They failed

to meet the deadlines at all,

but all of Rogozin’s teeth stayed right where they were.

Fine, any major construction project

gets delayed. But construction without

project documentation, holding

tenders in some completely shady

way, constant nonpayment of wages — that is,

there are no documents, no paperwork at all,

and they’re already building something. Building what? You can’t imagine

how many people wrote to us

through our black box tip line and sent all kinds of

information. We couldn’t publish all of it,

because some things, as you understand,

are probably protected as state

secrets, official secrets, or some

other category. But the theft and chaos

were on such an indescribable scale that we couldn’t

have imagined it. This is a cosmodrome, guys,

come on — a cosmodrome is not a shopping mall.

This is not a stadium.

This is a spaceport, where supposedly, well...

Good Lord, you are building a unique facility.

You keep talking about this unique

facility, saying that it is

a state priority; Putin himself

comes to visit, you hold government meetings,

and at the same time there is a monstrous

unimaginable mess: construction without

design documentation,

an incomprehensible construction sequence,

constant nonpayment of wages,

and work with obviously corrupt

contractors. It all simply looked

like some kind of monstrous circus.

The rocket, of course, probably did not fall

because of the spaceport itself.

It was a rocket malfunction, but overall

the aerospace industry, which is overseen by

Rogozin and by other people in

the government, is—I'll say it again—

such a mess that of course things

crash, and unfortunately will keep crashing

in the future. And if our authorities cannot

do anything except this kind of

snickering on Twitter about

some picture of a trampoline,

saying Americans will launch

their rockets with a trampoline,

what nonsense. I would trade everything

any position, that is,

just to end up in the trenches of Sloviansk,

as Dmitry Rogozin described during the time

of the active phase of the fight against Ukraine.

That is, instead of working, they puff themselves up

on Twitter, trying to make

an impression on someone.

Instead of properly and competently

spending the billions of rubles that were

allocated for all this. But look, one more

example from Twitter or something like that.

I'll answer why on the campaign headquarters channel

all the videos about last weekend's trips came out

except the one about Vladimir, asks

Alexander.

We are finishing the video about Vladimir now.

There was some kind of technical issue.

We make video reports about trips to every

city, and there will be one about Vladimir too. We make

these video reports; they are important to us because

after each of my rallies, all the

governor-friendly outlets, the federal

media, and the state media—not all of them, of course—

write that nobody came in Vladimir.

They photographed a few dozen

people who were in front of the stage before

the rally began, and then they circulated

the photos: look, nobody came to Navalny's

rally.

When in fact there were a lot of people.

Once again, many thanks to all the residents

of the city of Vladimir.

Alexei, please consider

adding subtitles to videos for deaf and

hard-of-hearing people. Thank you, writes Nastya.

That is an excellent idea, but we make subtitles

English subtitles for the main videos

so that people

who do not know Russian can watch them.

As I understand it, YouTube has

an automatic subtitles feature so that

at least some rough

automatic transcription or translation can be provided, so that deaf

and hard-of-hearing people can get it. We will think

about it. I do not think we will be able to make

subtitles for every video, but we will do it

And besides that, in the near future we plan

possibly by the next live broadcast

to post transcripts of all broadcasts directly.

So there will simply be the broadcast: there will be audio,

there will be video, essentially

the broadcast,

and there will be text—whatever people prefer.

That is how it will work. For example, I

read the broadcasts from Echo of Moscow (a Russian radio station)

because it does not take me long.

Listening takes too long; everything is too slow. I

prefer reading because I read

quite quickly. There are probably many people like that,

and we will give them the opportunity

to read. Ilona Yudina asks: Alexei,

good evening, what do you think about

the cost of the new logo for the 2018 election?

I think they stole a lot of money.

Have you seen the 2018 logo? A lot of people are already

mocking it online. It is a set of some kind of

generic template images, like this

distorted Russian flag, and all of this

cost 30 million rubles (about several hundred thousand U.S. dollars), and it was awarded to

the very same crooks who are connected, as I

understand it, to the well-known Sergei

Mikhailov, who is also involved with

the state news agency TASS. I do not

doubt, first of all, that

they are crooks; I do not doubt that they are

corrupt; I do not doubt that this is

a corrupt

relationship involving

Ella Pamfilova, the chair of the Central Election Commission.

Besides these 37 million rubles

that were simply stolen,

through this logo, much larger

sums are being spent through election information campaigns,

work on social media—that is, they are

effectively paying for some kind of

liars and trolls online with our

money. But most of that money they will

of course steal—they cannot help but steal it.

The whole system is built to steal.

That is all.

[inaudible]

Important information—they interrupted me here.

It is that many people cannot

do it through Sberbank Online because

Sberbank

is down. I do not know whether it crashed or whether they deliberately disabled

the ability to make donations maliciously. Maybe

Volkov talked Sberbank into it for some reason.

so that they too, so that he would win this bet

maybe it came in all at once

our donations — that sounds much

more

coherently. Anyway, guys, those who can't

use Sberbank, let me try

Yandex Money or QIWI — there are lots

of different methods there. What is it you're

putting up there? Yeah, someone, someone dropped

a serious amount of money — to put

this guy on the screen right now

Yesterday, for example, I just used

a bank card

a bank card. Alexei,

are any meetings or a rally in Moscow being planned, and

should we expect an all-Russian rally?

asks Mister Status. Basically, we've many

times — every week — submitted applications for

holding rallies in Moscow, and we are not

getting anything approved. Moscow has turned out to be, in

this respect, the most lawless

city. When we started a year ago

the election campaign, we thought that, well, in

Moscow we'd be campaigning actively,

holding rallies, while in the regions it would be

more difficult. But look, we held rallies in

regions like Kemerovo

we're opening [headquarters] in the south of the country, and where

some constant lawlessness is going on

in the most politically difficult

places

— Ufa, Kazan — and they don't allow rallies there either, but there

it's easier to work than in Moscow

The worst lawlessness is in Moscow. Sobyanin is

one of the biggest corrupt officials

in Russia. Besides that, all of his

activity is built on endless

lies

For example, just recently there was a

report

from Inrix saying that traffic jams in Moscow have only gotten

worse since 2013. What does

Moscow City Hall do? It doesn't comment on

the report, it doesn't try to refute it — instead it

spends a ton of money to push out of

public view any mention of the index itself

and information that Yandex published

such an investigation. In other words, it manipulates

information. That's why they are terribly afraid of

rallies and really do not want to

allow them in Moscow. We are facing the

greatest problems when organizing them there

Of course, I want to hold lots of rallies in my own city

So, about the aerospace

industry — I was saying that there's such a mess there that

that's why rockets keep crashing

Just think again about the scale of this mess

if the Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian government

states

stated this week that sixty-

four billion rubles out of the

106 billion rubles allocated for

airport construction — and this sector is

part of the broader aerospace industry

It's clear that allocating money for

infrastructure is also roughly in the same

sphere

And then Trutnev says they 'disappeared.' What does that

mean? He didn't even say whether it was misuse of funds

or something else

To say they 'disappeared' — just think how that sounds

More than sixty-four

billion of them disappeared because the

projects were poorly prepared, the

state review was not carried out on

time, and often the state review did not

approve the projects. I mean, it's hard

to find a worse word than 'disappeared'

for money. And when he says this

he said it at an official meeting

An official, a deputy prime minister, says:

'We allocated 106 billion rubles; 64

disappeared.'

You'd think red lights should start flashing

in the meeting room, the Investigative Committee

should issue press releases

and the prosecutor's office should launch an investigation

Trutnev should be fired, or

he should fire some of the

people responsible for the fact that

64 billion disappeared

Sixty-four billion is more than the annual budget

of most of Russia's largest

cities. They disappeared, and disappeared means

they were stolen, looted, squandered

stolen, basically. And that's treated as normal

Well then, of course rockets

crash. They can't help crashing if

things like this are happening, if

sixty-four billion rubles simply disappear

— half of the money allocated for

airports. And those airports, by the way,

are badly needed. I travel around the country

and getting around is impossible — it's a well-known fact

To get from Omsk to Tomsk, you have to fly through

Moscow. Our campaign coordinator in Moscow,

Sergei Boyko, who replaced Nikolai

Lyaskin, who moved to work at the

federal headquarters — he

is from Novosibirsk, and he told me

his grandfather died in Vladivostok. To get

from Novosibirsk to Vladivostok

guess which city he had to fly through

Not even through Moscow — through Seoul

Flying from Novosibirsk to Vladivostok

is cheaper via Seoul

What kind of country are we building then? What kind of

development of Siberia and the Far East can

we talk about if people are flying around Russia

through Seoul? That's why these airports are very

much needed, and despite that, this is still a

state priority. And 64 billion

rubles disappeared. Incredible — what else can

I say? Just fantastic. Alexei, what

do you think about nickel mining in the Voronezh

region?

What do you think should be done about it after

you become president? Nadia asks me.

I know the situation there very well.

They are planning to build a mining facility there.

For nickel extraction.

This project violates all

environmental standards, and local residents are against it.

They have spoken out clearly and, because of that, are being subjected

to outright gangster-style attacks and repression

from the police, and I am absolutely

opposed to the construction of this plant.

And certainly because this project has

That reminds me that our current

leader is...

zip x zip x has donated 8,100 rubles (about 8,100 RUB) for

rubles, and is now in line to receive this

sweatshirt featuring one-eyed me on it.

In second place is tolko pobeda sa with 8,000

rubles—a very small gap—and Ded Mazay (a folkloric old man character) is

at 7,666

rubles and 66 kopecks. My God, if Ded

Mazay wins, maybe it’s just Alisher Usmanov hiding behind the name.

But in any case, even Alisher Usmanov

will get this cool mug if Ded

Mazay holds on to third place.

A reminder: there’s a link in the description

where you can make a donation. Our

task today is to prove

to Leonid Volkov that we can raise during

today’s livestream—yes, yes, yes, yes—

that’s right, cue the GIF—

that we can raise during this

broadcast 450,000 rubles. I really hope

we can do it. So far, right now,

we have raised, to be precise, 308,000 rubles.

Guys, it’s now 21:01—I’m not going to cheat, we’ll

record the result, and at

21:18, push a little harder. Don’t let

Leonid Volkov giggle at me

for a long time.

Yura, regarding the previous question: if they don’t build

the nickel plant, where will people work?

Yura, this plant will not create a large

number of jobs, unlike, for example,

the Tominsky plant, which I also opposed

when I was speaking out against it, including

during my recent trip to Chelyabinsk. There is a lot of talk

on this subject, but in reality

there will be few qualified jobs there.

The environmental damage will be so severe that we

will spend on healthcare, in this situation,

in the Chelyabinsk region and in the case of

nickel in the Voronezh region, three times more money

than we would receive from extracting

these mineral resources and creating

jobs. Jobs do need to be created,

but you have to weigh things carefully. You can’t

poison people at the same time. If you’re

contaminating water intakes and then talking about

500 jobs, then the game probably isn’t

worth the candle.

We must create jobs, and nickel

can be mined, but it has to be done in a way

that does not harm people’s

health, and that does not harm children’s

health. Hello, Alexei,

a car enthusiast asks:

will car window tinting be allowed?

Ruslan Korol asks me. There are many

photos online—don’t scold me—

where I’m standing next to my very heavily

tinted car, which

I later sold. I was a fan of window tinting—I really

used to plan to tint my cars

completely blacked out.

And I broke the rules, I honestly admit, some

of the regulations that existed back then.

As for front-window tinting,

even though I used to do it all the time,

for example at 99 percent,

still, that was youthful foolishness; now I wouldn’t

do it. It’s the wrong thing, in my view.

I think the traffic police introduced

this overregulation of tinting largely

for corrupt purposes,

so that people wouldn’t be able to pass

vehicle inspection and would pay

more money. But those

completely blacked-out VAZ-2109s and VAZ-2108s

—I drove them myself—those cars are

definitely not right, and certainly neither are

those tinted Mercedes.

But first of all, they should strip off the tinting from

our officials’ cars. Just go stand

somewhere near the Investigative Committee building

and look at their tinted

Mercedeses going in and out.

By the way, stand near the traffic police building too

and see which cars are tinted.

So I believe that fully opaque tinting

on front windows is wrong, and first and foremost

above all,

officials should peel that tinting off.

Hot and Cold asks me:

what are the verification statistics, and which cities are the most active?

Thanks. Leonid Volkov will probably have more statistics

on that topic.

Verification is underway; it is an extremely important

process. You know that hundreds

of thousands of people have given us their

virtual signature and provided us with their

data, filled out forms, and gave us their phone

numbers. Right now we are conducting verification. This is

a crucial process because we must

make sure that, first, each person is real, and second,

that we see their passport and compare it with the

database used to check passports

by the Central Election Commission

so that we can review everything, verify it all, and

reduce the likelihood that they will

find fault with our signatures.

Candidates are always removed from the ballot precisely

because real, genuine, living people’s

passports, so to speak,

supposedly contradict some migration service database,

and the Central Election Commission says, “We trust the database,

not the passport.” That is why we are conducting

verification, and I urge everyone who has not yet

gone through it, but has received the email, to find

the time to come to any campaign office—it doesn’t have to be a specific one.

If you're in another city, you can

come by and sign up in another city.

Fill out the form — it's a very quick

process, and you won't have to wait in any

line. Sign up — May 1 is coming, and it's very,

very, very important. So, I've got

Oksana under the sun — what is that, what

does that mean? On Future, Lift has pulled ahead

into first place: 13,000 rubles (about $140).

Alexander Alexandrov — 10,000 rubles (about $110), and

Vladimir — 9,010 rubles (about $100). These are our leading

people at the moment, the ones who

are threatening all of you, dear friends.

They'll get these awesome prizes, and you

won't. So there's still

a little time left to overtake all that, and

there's still a little time left for

the progress bar down below to fill up.

12 minutes — let's wait 12 minutes.

Good Lord, just pick up the phone, call your wife,

the keys...

Look for money all over the apartment, send it

here — I mean, I can't help but raise

450,000 rubles (about $5,000).

Do you want to see the clip where a deputy is sawing

something? Here, I'm showing you the video — take a look at

it, please, and answer the question:

what is happening in this video? I'll tell you

what's going on there. So, the main and

only participant in this clip is

a deputy. What do you think he's doing?

Show us the video later — we'll keep it short.

[music]

A deputy is cutting through a door with an angle grinder. Well,

the obvious assumption is that the deputy is

a villain who decided to rob someone. He's

cutting through it to get inside, or maybe he's trying

to break into an office and make off with public

money stored in that office.

No, that's all wrong. The deputy you see in the footage is a good one.

The deputy you see in the video is a good deputy. His

name is Vadim Korovin. He was elected

as a deputy in Moscow's Fili

or Filevsky Park district

— I think it's Fili, or Filevsky Park,

but in any case, it's western Moscow.

In that municipal district, Vadim Korovin, together

with a group of allies, was elected

as a deputy, and they formed a majority

in their district. And now, naturally, they

should be able to take power and elect their own

chair of the municipal assembly, and

they did that — they elected Korovin

chairman, but acting chairman,

that is, they have a majority, but they do not have

two-thirds. And by law, if you don't have

two-thirds, then you basically can't remove

the previous one — actually, I misspoke, you can't

appoint your own chairman if

this one-third minority blocks

your votes. But you can elect

an acting chairman. They elected

Korovin as acting

head of the municipal assembly. So what

does United Russia do? Does it try to behave

decently and say, 'Muscovites and

residents of our city,

you made a choice not in favor of United

Russia, but in favor of Korovin's team,

so what can you do, we'll go into

opposition'? No, of course not. They

just locked the door. There are

a lot of astonishing videos from there — scissors,

everything.

He's saying something at a meeting, and some

guy from United Russia

pulls something out of his pocket and climbs over;

they block his microphone, block the doors, and don't let them

get to their workplaces. That's the

absolutely fantastic way

United Russia clings to power.

It's completely illegal — I mean, simply

illegal. They should all be jailed for this

— it's vigilantism and abuse of power, when

they don't allow the duly elected acting head

into his workplace. But

this is happening, and it's happening under the protection

of the police. And you remember that in Moscow there was

a relatively successful municipal

campaign — many independent deputies

were elected, but quite few of them

were able to turn that victory into

practical results. But Yashin (Ilya Yashin, Russian opposition politician) has been acting effectively:

he got elected and became head

of the municipal assembly. A few other

quite capable people did too. But all

the others, even when they have a majority on

the council, are fighting in this very visible

and bizarre way against United Russia.

Someone writes to us in the superchat about a dilapidated

dormitory: 'They're coming, we'll get three

exclamation marks.'

'On December 4 they'll come to show off, and they'll lock us in

our rooms and forbid us to leave. How can

we protest in that case?' Well, when

Putin specifically comes to visit, please

don't express your protest by

trying to break through doors or

throwing things around today, because, please, you could

get shot.

But it would make sense to express your protest

by, first of all, trying to ask him

a question, somehow getting to the right place properly,

and secondly, simply hanging something

on the dormitory to draw attention to this.

Also, record a video about your

dormitory, about the fact that Putin is coming

to visit you, and about the situation you're in.

I assure you, your shabby dormitory will immediately

start being repaired, because they

are very, very afraid of that kind of

publicity. Sberbank, TV Rain (Dozhd, independent Russian TV channel),

says: 'Sberbank has reported a failure during

card transactions.' But I don't

know — it would probably be super paranoid

to say that they stopped card

transactions so that I wouldn't be able to raise

450,000 rubles (about $5,000) live on air, but at least

That hit us hard, but we still have

seven minutes left.

Guys, how much do we still need?

We only have 6,000 rubles left.

Come on.

[music]

The ideal donation to our

election campaign is 500 rubles. If everyone gives 500

rubles, we’ll raise 450,000 rubles today.

Alexei, please tell us, Emil

Kerimov—there’s a question about Kerimov.

Emil asks: when you become

president, how will you build

relations with the oligarchs, and also with the

repressive state agencies? Emil Kerimov. So,

how will I build relations with the oligarchs?

For example, with your namesake, Suleiman Kerimov.

They should simply pay

taxes—taxes, and let them pay them. And there should be no

other kind of relationship between me and them.

There shouldn’t be.

They should pay taxes. In Kerimov’s case,

mineral extraction tax, property tax,

and so on. Because here’s the thing:

right now, what’s happening is that in France

Kerimov has been charged, and they are demanding

that he pay 400 million euros

in taxes in France. So what was he doing there,

buying up real estate, and why didn’t he pay those

taxes in Russia? And why

isn’t the Russian state demanding that he

pay taxes? My task as

president is to make sure they pay taxes

here, in Russia. Everything else

is far less important. I’m not really

planning to interact with these

oligarchs in any other way.

Alexei, why in Vladivostok, after all,

didn’t you answer the questions?

Guys, at every

rally I answer a lot of questions.

But a rally goes on for

an hour, an hour and a half on average.

I spend about an hour answering questions, and then

there’s some informal time when I

talk to people, shake hands,

take photos, and so on. But then

we had a flight out of Vladivostok—we were flying to

Khabarovsk, I think—so unfortunately

despite all my desire to do so,

I can’t answer every question. But

I do answer many of them. So, we have

a new top donor. There are still five minutes left

to knock them off the top spot. So, Evgeny

Kurpilyansky: 12,000 rubles and third

place—wants to get the mug. Future

Explosion: 13,000 rubles, second place. And I

Believe I Can Fly Off—got it,

great nickname—15,000 rubles. And Believe I Can

Fly Off is in line for this cool

sweatshirt. Five more minutes for

us to reach 450,000 rubles after all.

We need to prove it.

Leonid Volkov—I did it in your face.

He didn’t believe I could raise ten times

more. He was probably sure of it.

He came and said, if you’re

running for president, then go raise ten times

more than I did. I raised it. Thank you

so much, guys. Once again, I’m trying to be

a normal presidential candidate, the kind

a candidate is supposed to be. Today I brought in another 0.2

percent of our campaign budget.

Every candidate should do

something like that. Alexei Anatolyevich,

Angelika asks me:

please comment on the story

of the school principal and the schoolgirl from Kaliningrad.

I was very surprised by how far

they wanted to go to intimidate the girl. It’s a disgusting

story. A disgusting principal. Unfortunately, this is

happening all across the country right now.

The authorities are telling teachers:

make sure children stop going

to Navalny’s rallies. Children, students,

teenagers, teachers—and this is how they

act: stupidly, brazenly, and

insultingly toward schoolchildren

and toward their parents.

But unfortunately, this is just one example

of the degradation of the Russian education

system. Because regardless

of a teacher’s political views, a teacher

shouldn’t lie like that, and shouldn’t

talk to children that way. And besides, he

shouldn’t be so foolish. They

say things that are just

‘the internet is a garbage dump,’

‘don’t read anything on the internet, the internet is

a garbage dump.’ But that’s not a teacher anymore—you’re just

some kind of

obscurantist, a person from the last century. You

will never be able to teach children anything

if you say things like that.

And they listen to you and think:

my God, why is this person the principal of my

school? Same thing. Alexei Pronin asks:

do you plan to speak in

Kaliningrad Region, the most

European region of the Russian Federation?

I very much want to. From the first day of the campaign,

Kaliningrad Region has been one of the most

protest-minded regions, one of the great regions for

us. It’s very important. The authorities are afraid, and we are doing

everything we can to come to

Kaliningrad Region. Guys, just like with

all the other cities, when you write to me

asking why Alexei hasn’t come there,

the answer is: because we can’t

get approval there for a rally venue. That’s

all. That’s the only answer. I would travel

much more, I would speak much

more often, I would try to speak three times a

day—because that’s what a presidential candidate should do if

he’s a normal presidential candidate.

We would have mastered the logistics if we had

lots of venues, but we’re

simply not being allowed to have them.

In Russia’s million-plus cities, it’s almost impossible

to hold any events at all.

Though last week we did have some successful appearances.

We were in Chelyabinsk and Nizhny Novgorod first, but overall

of course, everything is very difficult right now.

We’re waiting for you in Saratov.

Yes, I’ll be there — to repeat, on Friday I’ll be in

Saratov, on Saturday I’ll be in Pskov, and on

Sunday I’ll be in Samara — I didn’t mix them up:

Samara, Saratov. So come

to the rally for sure — I’ll be glad to see

everyone there and answer your questions.

Hello, Alexei Khusainov. Artur

is taking us back to the beginning of our broadcast.

Please tell us: if they don’t allow you to run,

you’ll declare an election boycott. But you

know that a boycott is useless, and Putin

will win in any case. Well, tell me this:

I agree that a boycott

is not the most effective strategy, perhaps.

It’s hard to measure; you can’t say that we

won through a boycott. But then what isn’t

useless? You tell me a boycott

is useless — but what is useful? What am I supposed

to do — go and vote for

Gennady Zyuganov or Grigory

Yavlinsky? I would vote for them if

they were actually campaigning, if

they were doing something to earn my

vote and your vote, Artur. I would go and

vote for them. So this is not

useless — it is, in fact, the morally

right, ethically right choice:

not to take part in a procedure that

is not an election. We love elections and

respect the choice of voters, but only when

there is a real, genuine

candidate. When there is no candidate, it is not

a choice. This is a procedure that taking part in is

insulting, and we will not participate in it.

And we will actively persuade everyone that

they must not do it, and we will try

to inflict the maximum possible political

damage on this government through a boycott. Oksana,

please tell me — so, I’m summing up

the results of our voting — not voting,

let’s say, our fundraising marathon,

our contest for the biggest donation, so:

third place goes to Future Vzryv with 13,000 rubles

(about $140). Congratulations.

You win this wonderful mug.

If you want, I’ll sign it; if not, I won’t.

Thank you very much for your donation of 13,000

rubles

Second place goes to — I’d give a special

prize just for this username — “I Believe I Can”

with 15,000 rubles (about $160), and they receive

this stylish, flashy bag. In our

store it sells for 2,000 rubles (about $20).

“I Believe I Can Be King Live,” it’s yours. And in

first place, with a donation of 25,000

rubles (about $270) — congratulations, Stanislav, you

win this sweatshirt. Stanislav,

get in touch with us and tell us what

size you wear — you’ll receive a sweatshirt in the right

size. Thank you so much for this donation

of 25,000 rubles. Thank you, guys,

so much.

We understand that what really matters is the very fact of donating.

I’m grateful for that.

Whether someone sent 5 rubles, 50

rubles, or 25,000 — thank you so much.

This is real help for us. This is not

entertainment for us — this is real, truly

real money, and with these 450,000

rubles

— actually, 497,000 rubles, almost half a million

— that we’ve raised, with these 497,000 rubles we

will make real things:

stickers, sweatshirts, leaflets.

Volunteers will hand out these newspapers, we

will rent campaign offices, and we will travel

and speak in the regions. We will run

an election campaign so that,

thanks to your help, we can gain the support

of other people who are not yet

as engaged as you are.

Thank you, guys, for watching this broadcast.

Thank you so much — see you next

Oksana, what is it? Someone is shouting, “499!” Well,

come on, somebody throw in another thousand rubles,

otherwise Oksana is really going to

have a heart attack — she’s just sitting there already, and I

wish I could transfer it to you myself

right now in one big amount.

Well then — 500,000 rubles. Thank you very much, everyone.

Many thanks, see you next

Thursday. Bye.

[music]