Far-right figures respond to Alexei Navalny’s death by drawing ridiculous equivalences to Trump investigations
Published
Right-wing media figures responded to news that Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny has died in prison by drawing comparisons to the various prosecutions former President Donald Trump is facing in the United States.
Navalny was widely celebrated in the West as an anti-corruption crusader and a force for democracy in Russia. He was poisoned in August 2020 with a toxin that had been used in the deaths of other critics of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and has been in prison since early 2021. His death in a “penal colony 40 miles north of the Arctic Circle” was announced by Russian authorities on February 16.
Trump is facing an array of investigations and court cases at the federal, state, and municipal level. Special counsel Jack Smith is investigating Trump for his attempts to overturn the 2020 election, as is the district attorney’s office in Fulton County, Georgia. He is also on trial in New York for allegedly fraudulently manipulating his financial assets and paying hush money to porn performer Stormy Daniels.
Many far-right pundits on X (formerly Twitter) attempted to draw equivalencies between the two situations.