Valery Rashkin

Valery Fyodorovich Rashkin (Вале́рий Фёдорович Ра́шкин; born 14 March 1955) is a Russian politician who was a deputy for the Communist Party in the State Duma in 2000–2022.

Valery Rashkin was born on 14 March 1955 in the village of Zhilino, Nemansky District, Kaliningrad Oblast, in a large family of collective farmers.

In 1977, he received a diploma in mechanical engineering at the Faculty of Electronic Engineering and Instrumentation of the Saratov Polytechnic Institute and was sent to work at the local production association "Corpus".

Rashkin worked in there for 17 years, having proceeded from a process engineer to the head of the technological bureau and the chief dispatcher.

Valery Rashkin joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union in 1983.

From 1988 to 1990, he was the secretary of the party committee in the Corpus production association, where he worked.

He did not leave the party, and after the collapse of the USSR he moved to the Communist Party of the Russian Federation.

In 1990, he was elected to the Saratov City Council of People's Deputies.

From 1993 to 2011, Rashkin was the first secretary of the Saratov Regional Committee of the Communist Party.

In 1993, Rashkin was included in the Communist Party federal list in the elections to the 1st State Duma, but dropped out of it before the registration of candidates.

In the elections to the 1st Saratov Oblast Duma in 1994, he headed the list of the local electoral bloc "For Democracy."

He was elected one of the two deputy chairmen of the Duma.

In December 1999, Rashkin was on the CPRF's list in the elections to the 3rd State Duma, listed second in the Volga-Caspian regional group.

He also ran in Saratov constituency.

Rashkin received 31.66% of the vote, having more than doubled the result of his closest rival Vyacheslav Maltsev with 14.78%.

From 1999 to 2019, as a deputy of the State Duma, Valery Rashkin co-authored 197 legislative initiatives and amendments to draft federal laws.

In January 2000, Rashkin was nominated for the Governor of Saratov Oblast.

His campaign was accompanied by allegations of links to organized crime, untimely campaigning and voter bribery.

Rashkin himself and the Communist Party representatives accused the incumbent governor and his administration in initiating the "campaign of slander".

Rashkin was not on the ballot, since the regional election commission declared invalid 3,000 signatures in support of his candidacy, about 25% of its total number.

From March 2003 to April 2021, he was a member of the Presidium of the party's Central Committee.

In 2003 Rashkin was elected to the 4th State Duma by CPRF party list.

In Saratov constituency he was defeated by former ice hockey player Vladislav Tretiak.

In November 2006, at a meeting of the State Duma, Rashkin accused United Russia of corruption, referring to the fact that most of the officials prosecuted for it were members of that party.

After a complaint from United Russia deputies, the Duma Ethics Commission asked Rashkin to provide evidence.

He planned to refer to the list of 297 prosecuted MPs and heads of municipalities, which he received from the Prosecutor General's Office in June 2006.

The ethics commission found no indication of party affiliation in the cases; it considered Rashkin's statements inadmissible and deprived him of the right of speech during the Duma meetings for the next month.

In the summer of 2010, after the dissolution of the bureau of the Moscow City Committee of the Communist Party, he was appointed head of the Organizing Committee for convening a conference of the Moscow City Committee.

On 18 December 2010 he was elected first secretary of the Moscow City Committee.

In the 6th State Duma (2011–16) he was deputy chairman of the committee for nationalities.

In 2013 Rashkin became deputy chairman of the party's Central Committee.

In October 2014 he submitted a bill prohibiting government officials and their family members from owning property abroad.

The phrase "Rashkin's list" was repeatedly used by Rashkin himself and the media meaning lists of parliamentarians and officials who were accused by him of corruption and violation of the law.

In 2016 he lost the election in Lyublino constituency to TV presenter Pyotr Tolstoy.

After passing by party list he continued his work in the committee for nationalities of the 7th State Duma.

In the elections to the 8th State Duma, CPRF nominated Valery Rashkin in Babushkinsky constituency of Moscow.

His main rival was the United Russia candidate, TV presenter Timofey Bazhenov.

On 15 September 2021 Alexey Navalny's team included Rashkin in the list of candidates, supported by the Smart Voting campaign.

As five years before, Rashkin lost the constituency to pro-government candidate, but he entered the new Duma on the party list.

Rashkin was one of the organizers of protests against electoral fraud, having held the first rally on Pushkin Square in Moscow on the night of 20 September.