Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty
The latest indictment of former U.S. President Donald Trump remains one of the hottest topics in Russia. In the past, Moscow’s top propagandists frequently voiced their hope that in 2024, Trump will return to the Oval Office and immediately halt military aid to Ukraine, which would boost the Kremlin’s failing invasion of Ukraine.
Seemingly caught off-guard by this development, state media mouthpieces are resorting to outrageous comparisons between the pending criminal cases against Trump to the Kremlin’s treatment of dissidents like opposition leader Alexei Navalny, who was poisoned, jailed and today sentenced to an additional 19 years in prison on charges of alleged “extremism.” The talking point was apparently considered valuable enough to circumvent the unspoken rule of not mentioning Navalny’s name on Russia’s tightly controlled state TV networks.
During his Thursday’s morning show, Full Contact, decorated pro-Kremlin propagandist Vladimir Solovyov was joined by Dimitri Simes, former president of The Center for the National Interest, who was previously featured in the Mueller report. Solovyov told Simes, “Just recently, America was screaming at Russia and other countries, “How dare you touch Navalny and others?” Meanwhile, they were saying things that were much more seditious than what Trump said!”