Putin says he won’t congratulate Biden, vows to stand by Trump

President Vladimir Putin will not recognize Joe Biden as America’s president-elect, the Kremlin said on Monday.

It announced that they would continue to stand with Donald Trump while “there are ongoing legal processes” even though there’s little prospect that any of the incumbent’s complaints will be taken seriously by the U.S. courts.

Putin’s reticence is not surprising: Biden once called Russia “the biggest threat to America” and the Kremlin hangs on to old words and meanings.

Russian state TV made it clear throughout the election that Trump was the Kremlin’s preferred candidate, and in Moscow, politicians told the Daily Beast, “there is nothing good to expect from Biden.”

To the Kremlin there is no mystery about how Biden feels about Putin. Back in 2011, the then-vice president held a meeting with leaders of the Russian opposition at the U.S ambassador’s residence in Moscow, Spaso House. One of the participants, Boris Nemtsov, who was later assassinated in Moscow, wrote in his blog: “Biden said that [if he were] in Putin’s place, he would not stand for president in 2012, because that would be bad for the country and himself.”

Meanwhile, opposition leader Aleksey Navalny, who is recovering in Germany from an assassination attempt, clearly appreciated Biden’s past support, posting a congratulatory tweet: “Congratulations to Joe Biden and Kamala Harris on the victory and to the Americans on defining the new leadership in a free and fair election. This is a privilege, which is not available to all countries. Looking forward to the new level of cooperation between Russia and the US.”

Russian police raided Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation office on Thursday, and confiscated all the equipment and even a disco ball from the ceiling, along with some cash from the purses of employees.

“People in epaulettes often tell me that they are soldiers fulfilling commands by evil bosses,” Navalny wrote. “But yesterday’s raids-searchings at our offices demonstrated a complete degradation of the system to its very depths.”

Biden, in contrast to President Trump, has commented on the attack on Navalny—no other signal could be clearer to the Kremlin about the potential for the future relations with a Biden administration.

The Kremlin seems so nervous about Navalny, even while he is in Germany, that Putin refuses to speak his name publicly.