Last month, Ukraine celebrated 35 years of independence, a significant milestone given the internal and external pressures that have sought to undermine it throughout that time. Critics frequently question the resilience of Ukraine’s democracy, arguing that the war has intensified its longstanding problems, including corruption. Recently, I was asked whether the fact that elections in Ukraine have been suspended means Ukraine’s democracy is collapsing. It’s an important question, and one with a clear answer: no.
The renewed interest in Ukrainian elections is largely the result of a public announcement by former Minister of Defense Mykhailo Federov requesting “legal, safe, and realistic” elections after Zelenskyy removed him from his post earlier this year. Ukraine’s last presidential election was in 2019, and Zelenskyy’s term, under normal circumstances, would have ended in 2024. These are, of course, not normal circumstances. It should be said that despite being removed from his post, Federov remains a deeply respected Ukrainian official who is largely responsible for Ukraine’s remarkable advancements in drone warfare and whose innovations have saved countless Ukrainian lives. To reject Federov as anything but a committed patriot would be wrong. Just as wrong, however, is his call for elections at this time.
There are three central challenges to Federov’s request: constitutional, safety, and logistical. First, according to Ukraine’s constitution, the president is authorized to declare martial law, subject to ratification by the parliament. This process was completed in 2022. When martial law is declared, the Ukrainian constitution then not only authorizes the suspension of elections, it prohibits elections outright. To remove this prohibition, martial law would have to be removed—an impossibility in light of Russia’s increased ballistic missile attacks.
That leads to the second challenge: safety. Ukraine continues to face daily air raids in the form of Russian missile and drone attacks. The weekend leading into Ukrainian Independence Day, Russia attacked a shopping mall, killing 17 Ukrainians and injuring 130 more. While Ukraine remains strong, limited stockpiles of interceptor missiles threaten its longer-term security. Now more than ever, as Russia faces recruitment shortfalls, Putin is trying to take advantage of gaps in Ukrainian defenses to attack. This persistent Russian threat makes elections very difficult to execute safely.
The third challenge deals primarily with vote counting and Russian interference. Russia interferes in elections throughout the world—including the United States—because it sees influence operations as central to its military campaign. In fact, Russia reduced its military spending by $2 billion while simultaneously increasing its information operations budget by 54 percent this year. Russia would almost certainly interfere in any Ukrainian election, and its efforts would be advantaged by the chaos it has created since 2022. The United Nations lists over 3.7 million internally displaced persons and over 5.9 million Ukrainian refugees caused by the war. Add to that the 3.5 million Ukrainians and 25 percent of all physical polling stations currently under Russian occupation, as well as hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians on the frontlines, and you have an incredibly complicated voting environment ripe for Russian fraud.
Federov’s call for elections is well-intentioned but is ultimately misguided. At its core, democracy means that the people are sovereign. And in addition to the challenges listed above, recent polling by the International Republican Institute in Spring of this year suggests a majority (over 60 percent) of Ukrainians continue to believe elections should not be held until the war is over. This attitude is shared by Federov’s own supporters, many of whom pulled down their signs following his demand for elections. While it is vital to monitor democratic backsliding among our allies, democracy and popular sovereignty remain powerful, strong, and united in Ukraine—just as they were 35 years ago on the declaration of Ukraine’s independence.
