End of Democracy: How Pro-Russian Telegram Channels Influence Romanian Elections

On May 4, citizens of Romania will attend polling stations to elect a new president. This is a second iteration of the elections as the results of the 2024 presidential campaign were annulled after the unexpected success of Călin Georgescu — a far-right candidate sometimes referred to as “TikTok Messiah.” The nickname is given because of the social media platform that made his success possible and his blend of religious rhetoric, seasoned with anti-EU and Moscow-friendly narratives. Georgescu was banned from running to the office, but he still plays an important role in the campaign. OpenMinds explored Romanian Telegram channels and found that every fourth one serves as a direct conduit for Russian propaganda.
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The 2024 elections in Romania were cancelled by the Constitutional Court on December 6. One rationale for the cancellation was a declassified intelligence report that suggested a “state actor” was behind Georgescu’s popularity spike, particularly on TikTok. This cancellation, coupled with subsequent legal challenges and investigations into Georgescu's campaign, ultimately led to him being barred from the 2025 rerun, a decision upheld by the Romanian Constitutional Court at the beginning of March, amidst protests and political instability.
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Still, Georgescu remains an influential figure in both domestic and international politics.  His supporters are effectively mobilised on the streets, calling the government “thieves” and accusing it of a “coup d'état.” A couple of weeks ago, Tucker Carlson interviewed Georgescu, where he said that Romania might be used by NATO as a starting point for “World War III” – an echo of his January claim in an Alex Jones interview.  
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On his X account, Elon Musk said that barring Georgescu from the elections is “crazy”. Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, claimed that any elections without Georgescu would be “illegitimate”. Yet, another candidate might be a beneficial option for the Kremlin. His name is George Simion.
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Now, Simion plays the role of Georgescu’s successor, although not explicitly. He is the head of the far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR). Simion is banned from entering neighbouring Moldova and Ukraine because of attacks on both countries’ territorial integrity. His party has been hesitant to support Ukraine with weapons, and he claimed that he would cut all aid to Ukrainian refugees if elected president. His potential presidency will be a win for the Kremlin. Also, Simion describes his party as “natural allies of the Republican Party” and “perfectly aligned ideologically with the MAGA movement.” Finally, recent polls project a landslide success for him with around 30% of the votes. 
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Simion is highly critical of traditional media. His X account regularly features hashtags with the word “censorship”. One of his recent posts says: “Corrupt establishment hides and deletes my posts on certain social media. These globalists can't stand the idea that they can be defeated and lose power. This is why they crush freedom and impose censorship.” This exact situation is where Telegram gives shelter to the far-right and other radical voices. 
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Romanian Telegram Network
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Telegram is far from the first-choice social media when it comes to Romania. According to a consultancy company, Kepios, Telegram is well behind giants like Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and TikTok. Still, 26% of Romanians use it at least once a month. 
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Telegram, with less strict moderation rules, is often used by the far-right and other radical groups in European countries because they might be banned on mainstream platforms. A common strategy is to maintain a broad-reach presence on platforms like Facebook, while using Telegram for “uncensored” content aimed at hardline supporters or to slightly extend the reach. The latter strategy is evident in Romania, where mainstream outlets like G4Media and Digi24, as well as political bloggers such as Aurelian Popa and Dan Diaconu, maintain their presence within and beyond Telegram.
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Overall, we identified 202 Romanian-language channels that can be split into different clusters. 
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• The biggest cluster, occupying a quarter of the network, consists of right-wing and anti-EU channels (50 channels). The majority of their content, 42%, is dedicated to Ukraine, and 30% is about Romanian news.
   
• The second cluster is conspiracy channels (39), dedicating a third of its content to conspiracy theories and other alternative non-verifiable information on various topics, such as healthcare, politics, or religion.  
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• The third cluster is made of local pro-Kremlin actors (39) – channels that are somewhat similar to far-right in terms of domestic politics, but dedicating more content to pro-Kremlin perspective not only on Ukraine (43%), but on international politics (18%). Also, this cluster includes three Russian channels that target Romanians: Moldovan and Romanian versions of Sputnik, and Russia’s embassy in Romania. 
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• The fourth cluster consists of relatively neutral media and news aggregators (30), with more than 80% of the content being split between Romanian, Ukrainian, and international news.
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• The fifth is one of the distinct features of the Romanian network – religious channels (15). Although the majority of their content is largely apolitical, they still might be providing conservative political viewpoints on Romanian politics.

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Pro-Kremlin cluster, together with the far right, is the key disseminator of the narrative about Romania turning into a “dictatorship”. In the period since the annulment of the elections, we detected more than 1500 mentions of Romania being a “dictatorship under the control of globalist mafia”, averaging at nearly 13 mentions per day across various anti-government clusters. The growth is evident – one spike week saw 38% more mentions than the entire previous month. 63% of the content was posted by the pro-Kremlin channels. 
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The pretext of “opposing dictatorship” became the tactics for mobilising voters. Religious channels blamed the government for plotting a “coup d'état” and planning to destroy all “patriotic and Christian organisations”. Far-right politician Diana Șoșoacă, twice suspended from taking part in the election, addressed Putin on March 16 and claimed Romania to be the ‘real dictatorship’ with the illegitimate government that does not reflect the will of the people. Other channels view mass protests with the support of far-right parties as one of the few ways to reverse the ‘tyranny’.
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Conduits of pro-Kremlin Propaganda
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Within the Romanian Telegram scene, we found 48 Russian propaganda conduits, constituting 24% of the network. Conduit channels consistently reposted Russian propaganda since the beginning of 2022. The sources included English- or Romanian-language versions of state-sponsored media like RT and Sputnik, a channel of the Russian embassy in Romania, and other pro-Kremlin channels like war bloggers and news aggregators. 
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One example is amplifying Russian officials' voices, such as MFA spokesperson Maria Zakharova’s claim about the “cancellation” of Russian culture in Romania. Others include promoting Ukraine-related news with a pro-Kremlin slant, like blaming Ukraine for halting Russian gas transit.
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Overall, we found over 4000 unique reposts from Russian propaganda media, which is 103 per month on average. Among the leaders in the Romanian conduits “scoreboard” are mostly channels that tend to blend pro-Russian optics with conspiracy theories (like channels catrinaLudwig and cathysoim) or right-wing nationalism (DanMVChiticNecenzurat, dianafangrup). This context is usual for European countries as they consider Telegram to be a haven from “censorship.”
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Beyond direct reposts of pro-Kremlin content, a more subtle tactic involves relatively “clean” channels sharing posts. These may omit overt pro-Kremlin views (e.g., on ceasefire scenarios or the EU's role) but still help malign narratives reach wider audiences. We identified 48 conduits and 58 related channels — 52% of the whole Romanian Telegram. The actual number may be even higher, as some channels might use less open ways to spread the Kremlin’s viewpoint.
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Telegram channels support ‘anti-establishment’ candidates
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The current elections have 5 main candidates:
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• George Simion, a far-right politician and the leader of the AUR party, who aims to get votes from Georgescu-friendly voters. Although Georgescu himself has not supported any candidate publicly, Simion expressed the idea of making the barred candidate a prime minister if elected. According to the latest polls, Simion’s support rate is around 30%, the highest among registered candidates.  
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• Crin Antonescu, a candidate from the coalition parties of Romania – Social Democratic Party, National Liberal Party and the Hungarian minority party, UDMR. Although being a centrist parties’ candidate, Antonescu made conservative expressions by appealing to traditional family values. According to the polls, he started gaining popularity since early March and is a likely competitor of Simion in a potential second round, having a 20% support rate. 
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• Nicușor Dan, a mayor of Bucharest. This candidate supports raising defence spending and providing military support for Ukraine. He is endorsed by several liberal pro-European parties and has been polling around 20% as well. 
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• Victor Ponta, another right-wing candidate and a former Prime Minister (2015). He has a nationalist “Romania first” program, among which is a ban on transit of Ukrainian grain – a crucial export opportunity for Ukraine. He has ratings around 10%.   
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• Elena Lasconi, a liberal candidate and the president of Save Romania Union (USR). She placed second in the 2024 annulled elections, but did not manage to get support for the re-election with a rate of less than 10%. Her party decided to back Nicușor Dan, a founder of USR, because of this, claiming that it would be a shame to see no pro-EU representation in the second round.  
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Widespread dissatisfaction with the government appears across most clusters. To assess attitudes toward the government and candidates, we grouped far-right, anti-EU, conspiracy, and religious clusters into an anti-systemic category based on their political content. We then conducted sentiment analysis to observe each cluster’s perspective.
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Criticism of the current government primarily targets former president Klaus Iohannis and prime minister Marcel Ciolacu. Iohannis is widely faulted – even beyond anti-system actors – for failing to address corruption. Ciolacu and his party are accused of playing along with right-wing candidates and failing to present a unified alternative to counter populist movements.
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Most clusters maintain a relatively neutral stance towards a key candidate, George Simion. Even right-wing actors occasionally criticise him, portraying him as part of the “system” for participating in what they deem illegitimate elections. This “internal opposition” also questions his sincerity in supporting Georgescu, suggesting it is a mere tactic to gain votes.
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Crin Antonescu is portrayed more positively within the news and pro-EU clusters while being criticised in the anti-system cluster. However, the pro-EU cluster attitude tends to be more negative than the news’ due to suspicions of him not being an independent political figure but a “pawn” under Ciolacu's influence. 
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The most positive representation among the pro-EU cluster is of Elena Lasconi, despite her being an unrealistic candidate for winning the election. Although being an outsider, she is portrayed as the only adequate alternative to the current government among the candidates.   
  

Despite ranking high in polls, Nicușor Dan and Victor Ponta receive the least coverage in Telegram, leading to potential sentiment fluctuations. Most mentions are news-oriented, while emotionally charged posts tend to either praise the far-right or strongly criticise the ruling elite.
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Pro-Kremlin channels show a consistent alignment in their narratives about both Simion (and the far right) and “the system”. Beyond reposting Russian content on the war or international affairs, some also directly adopt Russian perspectives on the Romanian elections.

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Russia was active in supporting Georgescu’s campaign and criticising the government for annulling the 2024 elections, with local pro-Kremlin and far-right channels echoing some of these narratives. 
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Romanian right-wing news aggregator, @Wallachian_Gazette, reposted a publication by Rybar (a propaganda outlet under a close watch of the U.S. Government) that favours Georgescu’s ideas. Another example includes comparing the current Romanian government to Ion Antonescu’s rule, who was a World War II dictator and one of the perpetrators of the Holocaust. The comparison was placed in the context that Klaus Iohannis, ex-President of Romania, was dragging Romania into war with Russia. A similar case includes a repost of Sputnik’s publication about NATO planning to open a “second front” against self-proclaimed Russian satellite, “Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic”. 
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During the current presidential campaign, Russian state-backed media are not so active. However, the more favourable approach towards Simion is evident. For example, during recent Bucharest protests, RT placed him in the spotlight, underlining his claims about the current government turning Romania into a “banana republic”. More recent instances include citing Tucker Carlson’s interview with Gerogescu, who claimed that NATO “does not need free Romania” – although not mentioning Simion directly, but subtly playing along with his narratives.
 

Overall, it is evident that Romanian channels across all clusters are concerned about the future of Romania, which is currently unclear. Keeping in mind the rapid success of Georgescu, who was merely a statistical error in polls before the 2024 elections, nobody is sure about the outcome of the new elections. Moreover, it is hard to predict the competitors of the potential second round since there are three candidates within a 15-20% support frame, and 40% of voters are still undecided. Adding on top, the leading candidate, Simion, is currently being scrutinized regarding the funding sources of his campaign. 
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Turning into a “Dictatorship”
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Calling the current Romanian government a “dictatorship”, “mafia”, “globalists” and “deep state” has turned out to be a regular part of pro-Georgescu supporters’ playbook. George Simion called the annulment of elections an “end of democracy”, outlining that the current political situation in Romania is not only about the country, but about the future of democracy in Europe as a whole. 
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The narratives about Romania turning into a “dictatorship” coincide with the Russian officials’ view of events. Dmitry Medvedev commented on the persecution of Georgescu by saying that “the deep state has effectively put democracy six feet under” and sarcastically compared the Romanian government to Nicolae Ceaușescu’s regime – a former Communist dictator who had been in office since the mid-1960s. 
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The annulment  and overall dynamics of Romanian politics gave rise to “the ghost” of Nicolae Ceaușescu. He was a hardliner, imposing strict censorship, liquidating political competition, and establishing the pervasive cult of personality. His career finished on Christmas 1989 – he and his wife Elena were executed by oppositional Romanian army soldiers. 
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In the electoral context, anti-government forces take somewhat contradictory approaches to the image of Ceaușescu and, more broadly, the legacy Communist regime in Romania. After the annulment of the results, one camp started comparing the current government to the previous regime. Dan Chitic, a head of the far-right Coalition for the Nation, set a Facebook banner with two dates – March 1945 (establishing of the Communist regime) and March 2025 (rejection of Georgescu from running in the re-election). Another camp actually compares Georgescu with Ceaușescu in a positive light – claiming that both faced accusations without any proof. Both camps take opposite approaches to Ceaușescu’s image, but are still united in one thing – supporting Georgescu.
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As George Simion gains momentum and leads in first-round polls, campaigning to "restore democracy" in Romania, the upcoming elections are crucial for NATO's regional position. Romania's key role as a logistics hub on the Alliance's eastern flank, coupled with NATO's construction of its largest European military base near Constanța, underscores this significance. While Simion claims support for NATO under US leadership, Romania's EU future, and security guarantees for Ukraine, Brussels will closely monitor the elections. Simion’s intention to bring Georgescu back into politics raises concerns about the Kremlin potentially gaining a new Trojan horse within the EU.
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Methodology
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Our research encompassed the collection of 4,717,615 messages from 252 Romanian-language, Russian-language, and English-language Telegram channels covering Romania and Moldova and reposted by Romanian-language channels, spanning from January 1, 2022, to April 4, 2025. We then filtered only Romanian-language content and focused on 3,116,747 messages from 202 channels.  
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‍The selection of Telegram channels was formed using multiple strategies: based on Telemetrio statistics and data on reposts between channels. This approach ensured broad coverage of various information sources. Using the Telegram API, we scraped the content of these Telegram channels and information about repost sources for each channel.
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To categorise conduit channels, we applied the criterion of reposts or references to Russian media channels, organisations, and bloggers. Manual verification was conducted to exclude random coincidences. 
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Further classification of channels was carried out according to four main categories: Pro-Kremlin, Far-right / anti-EU, Conspiracy, Religion, News, Pro-EU / pro-Ukrainian. The labelling was done manually. Pro-Kremlin channels were identified by the promotion of Russian government positions, anti-Ukrainian content, and distorted coverage of the Russo-Ukrainian war. Far-right / anti-EU channels were identified by ultranationalist and xenophobic rhetoric, anti-immigration sentiments, promotion of authoritarian values, and a critical stance towards the European Union. Conspiracy channels were characterised by the promotion of alternative explanations for world events, theories about secret societies and global elites, and anti-establishment rhetoric. Religious cluster was identified by predominantly church-related content, such as Bible quotes or news of the Romanian Orthodox church. News cluster is characterised by relatively neutral publications and no distinct theme of content. Pro-EU / pro-Ukrainian channels reposted content from Ukrainian media and bloggers, supported Romanian liberal candidates, and had a critical stance regarding the Kremlin. 
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To identify the main thematic clusters in the message array, we employed topic modelling. This machine learning method allowed us to discover patterns and group documents by content similarity. For each identified cluster, brief thematic summaries were generated using the GPT 4o-mini language model, providing the research team with an overview of the main discourse directions across all four research topics.
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Sentiment analysis regarding the candidates and the Romanian government was conducted based on filtered data containing mentions of key Romanian politicians and parties. Using the Gemini-2.0-flash model, we extracted mention objects (presidential candidates and the government) and determined the sentiment of statements. To account for the media's inherent negative bias, we developed a modified sentiment index where neutral mentions are weighted as moderately positive (0.6). This approach reflects that neutrality in polarised media often represents a conscious choice for balanced coverage. The sentiment index is calculated as (Positive + 0.6*Neutral - Negative) / (Positive + Negative + Neutral), acknowledging that the absence of negative coverage can be interpreted as a relatively positive signal.