‘It’s half-reward, half-trial’ Why Putin appointed a veteran politician to take over as governor of Russia’s partially occupied Kursk region
‘It’s half-reward, half-trial’ Why Putin appointed a veteran politician to take over as governor of Russia’s partially occupied Kursk region
On Thursday evening, December 5, Vladimir Putin made another leadership change in Russia’s beleaguered Kursk region, appointing politician Alexander Khinshtein as acting governor.
Khinshtein is a former journalist and television presenter who spent the 1990s at the newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets, where he was notorious for collaborating closely with law enforcement. Since 2003, he’s been a deputy in the State Duma, helping to draft repressive laws, cheerleading the invasion of Ukraine, and siccing the authorities on supposed enemies of the state. From 2016 to 2018, he served as an adviser to National Guard chief Viktor Zolotov. To this day, Khinshtein heaps praise on the agency.
Khinshtein has no prior connection to the Kursk region, so it’s no surprise that Putin focused instead on the deputy’s ties to Russia’s police and security apparatus, arguing that such experience is crucial now in Kursk (which remains under partial Ukrainian occupation):
I’d like to propose the position of acting governor of the Kursk region, considering that crisis management is currently needed there. […] You have very good experience and relationships in executive authorities and, due to your previous work in security structures, all of this must be used to address the tasks at hand.
Putin’s gubernatorial appointment decree claims that Khinshtein’s predecessor, Alexey Smirnov, resigned “of his own accord.” Smirnov lasted only six months on the job. He was appointed acting governor in May 2024 and, at least officially, won September’s election with 65.3 percent of the vote.
Transport Minister Roman Starovoyt, who served as Kursk’s governor before May 2024, says Smirnov stepped down because he “encountered difficulties in establishing communication with the public.” According to Meduza’s sources close to the Putin administration’s domestic policy team, Smirnov’s “difficulties” emanated from the disgruntled refugees forced from their homes by the Ukrainian military’s surprise incursion into the region in August 2024.
Smirnov struggled to manage refugees’ expectations and the government’s limited emergency relief. As Meduza previously reported, most people in the Kursk region who fled Ukrainian troops initially believed they would be able to return home within a few weeks. Though the Kremlin understood early on that retaking the occupied territory would require several months at least, regional and local officials in Kursk didn’t communicate these realities to their constituents. Rapidly dwindling state assistance for refugees made the crisis even more acute.
In early November, a group of refugees staged something in Kursk’s main square that’s become rare in Russian cities: a protest. Smirnov’s administration responded with promises to address refugees’ concerns, including a pledge to dismiss several local officials. Weeks later, however, many of these people are still at their posts.
“Smirnov is a typical administrator. He’s a bureaucrat, which is fine for many governors, but not in a crisis and not on the front line,” explained a source close to the Kremlin.
A political strategist who’s worked in Kursk told Meduza that a “very idiosyncratic system of governance” has developed in the region over the past several decades. “A former Communist Party member, Alexander Mikhailov, managed the region for nearly 20 years [from 2000 to 2018]. His executive style was pretty Old School — not even 1990s-era, but like something out of 1970s stagnation,” explained the political strategist. When he replaced Mikhailov, Roman Starovoyt apparently did little to overhaul his predecessor’s “outdated system.” “Many of the local officials, even at senior levels, remained in place, and it was still mostly Mikhailov’s people or older at the mid-levels, too. But Starovoyt didn’t seem to care — he preferred to spend time in Moscow, aiming for a promotion, which he eventually got,” said the political strategist.
According to Meduza’s sources close to the Kremlin, the Ukrainian incursion into Kursk led Putin’s domestic policy team to discuss canceling the region’s September elections and replacing Smirnov with someone “more suitable.” However, the administration delayed this change after the Ukrainian military’s initial success. “They decided not to act. [They wanted] to show that everything was stable and that Ukraine couldn’t influence even that,” a source told Meduza.
The search for a new governor resumed after refugees began protesting. “Smirnov couldn’t hack it,” said a source close to the presidential administration. However, finding someone willing to lead a partially occupied region proved difficult. According to Meduza’s sources, National Guard chief Viktor Zolotov lobbied for Khinshtein’s candidacy. Sources also noted that Khinshtein continues to act informally as one of Zolotov’s PR consultants
“Khinshtein has been eying a governorship for a while — not in Kursk, of course, but somewhere more appealing. But they offered him what they offered him, and he could hardly refuse. Well, he could have said no, but that would be his last invitation from the executive branch. So, he had to accept. Khinshtein is no stranger to the [power] vertical. He knows the rules,” a source close to the Putin administration told Meduza.
The same source added: “The National Guard will oversee the region’s security after the Ukrainian Armed Forces are driven out, and the governor must have a good relationship with the agency’s leadership.” The Kremlin reportedly hopes that Khinshtein will leverage his public communications prowess to “engage in dialogue with residents, calm them down, and, if necessary, be firm.”
A source in the country’s ruling political party, United Russia, told Meduza that he expects Khinshtein to “dismantle the entrenched local system” and “force everyone into line.” If this comes to pass, it wouldn’t be the first time with Khinshtein, who’s managed before to purge prominent regional officials.
At the same time, Meduza’s Kremlin-linked sources don’t rule out that the appointment may be only temporary: “For now, this is an emergency measure. If the crisis is resolved, Khinshtein may be promoted; if not, they can always send him back to the State Duma. After all, new elections are coming in 2026. The appointment is half-reward, half-trial. He might really take off, or he might sink his whole career.”
Text by Andrey Pertsev
Translation by Kevin Rothrock