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In February 2025, nearly a third of Russians expressed favorable views of the United States—the highest level recorded since before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Is this shift merely a short-term response to Donald Trump’s return to the White House and his promises to end the Russia–Ukraine war and “reset” relations with Moscow? Or does it signal a deeper, more enduring transformation in how Russians perceive the U.S.?
I argue that Russian attitudes toward the U.S. are largely the product of a deliberate, long-running effort by the Kremlin to shape public opinion through state-controlled information campaigns. While the Russian government achieved some tangible results, it now finds itself constrained by the very narrative architecture it has built. The actors once mobilized to amplify pro-Kremlin messaging have, in some cases, become powerful voices in their own right, complicating Kremlin efforts to recalibrate its messaging and war strategy.
To investigate the Kremlin’s messaging strategy about the U.S., I focused on Telegram, which has had an outsized role in shaping the national conversation about Russia’s war in Ukraine. I scraped all posts from 56 major Telegram channels published between September 1, 2024, and March 31, 2025. These channels belong to state-aligned media outlets, political influencers, ultrapatriotic figures, and aggressively prowar commentators (see Figure 1). From a total of nearly 296,000 posts, I extracted over 39,000 that mentioned Trump or the U.S. I then used semantic network analysis to identify dominant narratives and themes.
Tracing the Kremlin’s Messaging Shifts
In September and October 2024, the Russian discourse about the U.S. focused largely on foreign policy flashpoints involving Washington. Telegram channels were reacting to events like the Red Sea crisis, Iranian strikes on Israel, and rising tensions between Washington and Venezuela. This came alongside near-daily battlefield updates, which often celebrated Russian advances and the destruction of U.S.-made military hardware (see Figure 2).
Another major theme at the time was the U.S. presidential election. Telegram was full of speculation and commentary about the race, including a flurry of dramatic posts surrounding the assassination attempts on Trump. His opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, was consistently portrayed in a negative light. Russian media ridiculed her public speaking, recycled criticisms from U.S. sources like Fox News and Trump’s Truth Social, and framed her as fundamentally hostile to Russian interests. In contrast, the coverage of Trump was overwhelmingly positive.
How did this filter down to ordinary Russians? In September, 37 percent of Russians said they preferred Trump to win the U.S. election, compared to 5 percent who favored Harris. When asked to name the most memorable events of the month, most Russians nonetheless pointed to developments on the battlefield in Ukraine. The U.S. election was mentioned by only 1 percent of respondents. While Trump-related messaging was part of the information landscape, it was overshadowed, for most Russians, by everyday domestic and personal issues.
By November and December, the media spotlight had shifted to the U.S. and UK decisions to allow Ukraine to strike Russian territory with long-range weapons, as well as Russia’s retaliatory launch of the Oreshnik hypersonic missile. These two events were ranked as the most memorable of the month. Messaging about Trump’s intention to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and pursue dialogue also appeared in the Russian information space, and a public opinion poll conducted in November suggested a subtle increase in support for a ceasefire and negotiations with Ukraine.
By the time Trump was inaugurated in January 2025, the information environment on Telegram had grown much more congested. Trump’s executive orders, a potential Trump-Putin meeting, and prospects for a ceasefire quickly emerged as the dominant themes, surpassing even battlefield developments in salience. The Institute for the Study of War, citing sources connected to the Kremlin, reported that pro-Kremlin media around that time received guidance to portray Trump in a positive light. Telegram channels ramped up their coverage of initiatives associated with Trump and his team, drawing a sharp contrast with what they painted as European obstructionism. By end-February, a Levada Center poll showed that 51 percent of Russians held a favorable view of Trump.
In March, however, the narrative began to shift again. Talk of a ceasefire quieted down. Instead, the spotlight turned to Putin, especially following his call with Trump. The latter was cited by Russians as the most memorable event of March. According to some reports, the Kremlin issued a directive instructing state media to shift the emphasis away from praising Trump and toward highlighting Putin’s statesmanship and diplomatic credentials.
When Propagandists Push Back: The Kremlin’s Discursive Dilemma
The Kremlin has invested significant resources to shape Russian public opinion, and it has achieved some tangible results, demonstrating the ability to steer sentiment in directions that align with its political agenda. Polling data from the Levada Center has offered a unique opportunity—a kind of social laboratory—to observe how Russians have responded to the rapid developments in U.S. policy and politics, as spun through the Kremlin’s media strategy.
Yet in its effort to control public opinion, the Kremlin now finds itself constrained by the very propaganda machinery it has built. Over the past three years, relentless state-driven messaging has framed Washington and Kyiv as existential threats to Russia, with the U.S. depicted as funding a proxy war in Ukraine. This narrative has become deeply entrenched and cannot be reversed overnight. In fact, more than half of Russians still view the U.S. unfavorably, often citing a lack of trust in U.S. intentions, Washington’s continued support for Ukraine, and its perceived hostility toward Russian interests. These attitudes reflect the very narratives the Kremlin has long promoted and reinforced.
In its effort to cast the U.S. and Ukraine as existential threats to Russia and rally public support for the war, the Kremlin mobilized a sprawling network of information warriors. On the one hand were state-backed propagandists and pro-government influencers, who increasingly struggled to maintain narrative cohesion and contain growing public frustration. On the other hand were voenkory, independent war bloggers reporting directly from the front lines, who are appreciated both in Russia and in the West for their firsthand, real-time coverage. Voenkory have been simultaneously among the staunchest supporters of the invasion and among the most vocal critics of how the “special military operation” is conducted. Their unique position outside of state media has given them credibility and influence but also made them difficult for the Kremlin to control fully.
The Kremlin has attempted to co-opt this influential group by awarding state honors, integrating some voenkory into official advisory bodies, and using their platforms to reinforce state messaging. At the same time, it has cracked down on dissenting voices, with some voenkory being arrested or censored when they have crossed the line by criticizing Putin himself. This delicate mix of co-optation and coercion illustrates the Kremlin’s dependence on, and discomfort with, these bloggers.
The relationship between the Kremlin and the most hardline supporters of the war has always been uneasy. These figures do not always toe the official line. In particular, the Kremlin’s recent efforts to pivot toward a more conciliatory tone in its messaging on the U.S. and Ukraine have triggered a backlash in these circles.
Among the most vocal prowar voices, the term “dogovornyak”—slang for a shady, backroom deal—has emerged as a rallying cry. It encapsulates deep skepticism toward any form of negotiated settlement and casts diplomacy as a betrayal of the war’s original aims. One prominent blogger with such views is Boris Rozhin, a Sevastopol native who runs the influential Telegram channel @colonelcassad, followed by over 850,000 users. Rozhin has repeatedly reminded his audience that Russia has yet to achieve its broad political agenda in Ukraine, namely, full control of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia regions, along with expanded territorial gains in Kharkiv and Dnipropetrovsk regions. His posts frequently deride the Ukrainian military as a Western proxy and criticize the Russian government for abandoning the goals that it used to justify the full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Echoing Rozhin’s message, Voyennyy osvedomitel’ (@milinfolive), another widely followed Z-channel with over 600,000 subscribers, uses sarcasm and mockery to challenge the Kremlin’s position indirectly. One post quips: “The special military operation will end in 2025. Trump will stop funding Ukraine, Zelensky will capitulate, and the Russian economy will recover. Everything will return to the good old days… But that is just a media lie, censored to hide the scandalous facts.”
Meanwhile, Alex Parker Returns, a Z-channel associated with the Prigozhin media ecosystem, has taken a sharper tone, accusing Putin of turning Russia into a mere “resource appendage” (syr’yevoy pridatok) of the U.S. after he floated the idea of a joint U.S.-Russia venture to extract rare earth minerals in Russia. Putin responded by warning, in his signature oblique style, of unnamed “forces” seeking to sabotage the peace process—an implicit acknowledgment of the disruptive influence currently wielded by these so-called turbo-patriots.
While the influence of online war zealots should not be exaggerated, they have become an increasingly prominent part of the Russian information space. Furthermore, their following may soon grow, drawing from the ranks of Russian veterans coming home from Ukraine.
One often-overlooked reason why the Kremlin may be inclined to prolong the war is the political challenge posed by the growing and potentially destabilizing bloc of war zealots, ultranationalist patriots, and veterans’ organizations that show defiance to state messaging. Since 2022, Russian authorities have launched a range of measures to suppress both online dissent and offline mobilization by Prigozhin-style actors and disaffected veterans. These efforts reflect a deep-rooted fear within the Kremlin of a repeat of the post-Soviet Afghan war experience. In that period, disillusioned veterans, abandoned by the state, turned to civic activism and/or formed loosely structured groups that later evolved into far-right nationalist movements. Some of these groups became persistent sources of domestic dissent and, in certain cases, directly challenged the authority of the Russian government.
Conclusion
The case of Russia’s domestic discourse around the U.S. in the Trump era illustrates two interrelated dilemmas of modern authoritarian information control. First, the stronger the narrative, the harder it is to rewrite. Most Russians have been slow to respond to the shift in Kremlin-backed messaging and continue to view the U.S. in a highly negative light.
Second, the Kremlin’s biggest challenge is not to control the narrative for the people in the middle but to rein in a volatile ideological base that it once empowered and that continues advocating maximalist war aims. Ex-Wagner mercenaries, voenkory, former combatants, and hardline ultranationalists remain fiercely committed to the idea of total victory and are deeply suspicious of any rhetoric suggesting compromise. With massive Telegram followings, these actors have demonstrated the ability to fracture Kremlin-aligned consensus, challenge official narratives, and mobilize outrage whenever they sense ideological backtracking.
The Kremlin may still command the stage, but the actors it has created are no longer passive. They are politicized, mobilized, and, at times, unpredictable—a reality that complicates Russia’s war strategy.
Figure 1. The network of influential telegram channels involved in messaging about the United States, Trump, and Russia’s War in Ukraine
Source: Author (visualization using Gephi version 1.10.1, March 2025)
Figure 2. Changing discourse about the United States, Trump, and Russia’s War in Ukraine
Source: Author (visualization using Gephi version 1.10.1, March 2025)
Dr. Mariya Y. Omelicheva is a professor of strategy at the National Defense University with expertise in international and Eurasian security, counterterrorism, human rights, democracy promotion, gender and security, and the crime/terror nexus in Eurasia.
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