# How did Crimea vote 97% in favor of rejoining Russia **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 17, 2014, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952 "2014-03-17T21:50:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2014, 10:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952/21 "2014-03-18T10:47:10Z")
> [@Jeff\_Lichtman](#): > > This outcome is about what I expected. The Russians didn’t allow members of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe to observe the election. This suggests there was cheating going on - if the election were held fairly, wouldn’t they want observers to validate it? I think you are mistaken. My understanding is that the OSCE _were_ invited, but they refused to attend because the invitation came from the local Crimean government, not the national Ukrainian government, and only the latter has the authority to issue such invitations. At least, this is what Reuters is reporting: [Crimea invites OSCE observers for referendum on joining Russia](http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/03/10/ukraine-crisis-referendum-osce-idUSL6N0M73AP20140310) ---
**Author:** ![Keyzer\_Soza](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a587f6/32.png) [@Keyzer\_Soza](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keyzer_Soza)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2014, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952/22 "2014-03-18T18:18:05Z")
97% is still very suspiciously high. There are no hints of secession in Ohio but I don’t know if you’d even get 97% of them voting to remain in the US if polled? ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2014, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952/23 "2014-03-18T19:47:19Z")
> [@Bosola](#): > > Why the assumption that the vote was rigged? Most people expected strong support for rejoining Russia; plebiscites can and do result in extremely large majorities; the opposition has refused to vote; Crimeans who voted in the Party of Regions have been horrified to see a minority protest group (Euromaidan) seize power without an election and immediately make overtures to ban their political opponents, put far-right, anti-Russian politicians in key ministerial positions and demote the status of the Russian language. > > Even the opprobrium of Western leaders has been that the referendum is ‘unconstitutional’ and ‘rushed’, not fraudulent. Given that these talking heads just supported the decidedly unconstitutional movement of “demanding a unilateral change in government without an election because we don’t like our president’s policy decisions” only a few months ago, complaining that a plebiscite doesn’t sit with Kiev’s 2004 constitution all seems rather silly. > > The narrative of ‘big, bad Russia and its tyrants versus earnest Western liberal democracy’ is an appealing one, but the situation in Eastern Europe is a lot more complicated than it looks. Nope. There is nothing “complicated” about a plebisite held under the guns of an invading power, organized in two weeks, without any credible neutral oversight (and with the press suppressed), voting overwhelmingly in favour of that invasion, being wholly without legitimacy. Never mind the fact that the plebicite in issue did not even have an option for maintaining the status quo. Noting that the plebicite is wholly without legitimacy does not require any analysis of the alleged shortcomings of the current Kiev government; the fact that ‘most people expected’ support for joining Russia is equally irrelevant (in fact, allegedly a previous poll had approval for annexation running at 40%). Cite: [Many Signs Pointed to Crimea Independence Vote — But Polls Didn’t | FiveThirtyEight](http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/many-signs-pointed-to-crimea-independence-vote-but-polls-didnt/) So we have gone from 40% in a poll a month ago, to 97% in the plebicite. Russia’s propaganda move here has been astonishingly inept. If indeed a strong majority in Crimea favoured Russian annexation, Russia ought to have been bending over backwards to make the plebisite as fair as possible - such approval would have gone a long way towards undermining Western opposition. As it is, the rational response to such a rigged plebicite is to find that it lacks any credibility. ---
**Author:** ![Jeff\_Lichtman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jeff_lichtman/32/1531_2.png) [@Jeff\_Lichtman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jeff_Lichtman)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2014, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952/24 "2014-03-19T03:41:39Z")
> [@psychonaut](#): > > I think you are mistaken. My understanding is that the OSCE _were_ invited, but they refused to attend because the invitation came from the local Crimean government. . . [OSCE says they were prevented from entering Crimea by armed men.](http://www.euronews.com/2014/03/15/thwarted-crimea-mission-of-osce-observers/) ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2014, 7:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952/25 "2014-03-19T07:18:11Z")
> [@Jeff\_Lichtman](#): > > [OSCE says they were prevented from entering Crimea by armed men.](http://www.euronews.com/2014/03/15/thwarted-crimea-mission-of-osce-observers/) Did you read anything beyond the headline? The first paragraph makes it clear that the observers who were denied entry were “OSCE military observers”, not election observers as we were discussing here. The last paragraph of your article says that the OSCE deliberately chose not to send any “election monitors” even though the Crimean and Russian governments wanted them. ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [March 19, 2014, 8:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952/26 "2014-03-19T08:06:49Z")
> [@Bosola](#): > > Why the assumption that the vote was rigged? When there’s demonstrable evidence 123% of the population voted in at least one (critical) example it’s not really an “assumption” any more, is it ? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-crimea-vote-97-in-favor-of-rejoining-russia/683952.md?page=1)