Did Putin's press secretary say that the country's leadership wants to restore Russia from the time of Nicholas II?

For several years, the quote “We want to restore the Russia of the times of Nicholas II - this is our ideal” has been actively disseminated on social networks. The statement is attributed to the presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov. We checked to see if he actually said this.

Publications with comments on Peskov’s similar statement began to appear back in 2016. At first the quote was used in tweets And posts in Odnoklassniki. Later, Yandex.Zen users also began to spread Peskov’s statement, one of such materials read 25,000 platform users. December 12, 2020 intro for this post published on his Instagram with almost 900,000 subscribers, entrepreneur Evgeny Chichvarkin.

These publications appeared at different times and on different platforms. Some of these texts have been read dozens of times, some tens of thousands. And yet they have a common feature: none of the materials about Peskov’s statement contains a reference to his public speech or statement with such a quote. Some authors, for the sake of credibility, provided their publication with a photograph of the president’s press secretary, which in itself does not prove anything, but in the eyes of an inexperienced reader makes the material convincing.

We were unable to find the phrase “We want to restore Russia from the time of Nicholas II - this is our ideal” in public speeches or texts of the president’s press secretary. A similar idea can be found in interview “Komsomolskaya Pravda”, which Dmitry Peskov gave in May 2016. Speaking about the future scenario for the country, he said about Russia at the end of the 19th century: “This is one of the most wonderful times, with all sorts of great social cataclysms, difficulties and everything else, but this is a time when, as they say, serfdom has been abolished, when we have a golden age of literature, when a rapidly growing economy, when the ruble is strong, when we are competitive in the world, when we have strong science, when we have something to be proud of. It's a really good image."

This quote really belongs to Peskov. Just not Dmitry Sergeevich, but Dmitry Nikolaevich. Namesake of the Presidential Press Secretary takes position of director of the “Young Professionals” direction of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives and works Special Presidential Representative for Digital and Technological Development.

In 2016–2017, bloggers attracted readers with loud headlines that began with the words “Peskov said” and then told which Peskov they were talking about. By 2020, the quote had acquired a “canonical” appearance and had finally lost contact with its true author. Users of social networks and blogging platforms, in turn, publish it with a photograph of the more famous Dmitry Peskov.

Incorrect quote attribution

What do our verdicts mean?

Read on the topic:

1. https://www.saratov.kp.ru/radio/26533/3550221/
2. https://digital.ac.gov.ru/poleznaya-informaciya/4198/
3. http://kremlin.ru/catalog/persons/309/biography