Victor Shenderovich

Victor Shenderovich was born in 1958 in Moscow

Shenderovich was born in Moscow in 1958 into a Jewish family of Belarusian origin. In 1980 he graduated from the Moscow State Art and Cultural University, where he studied theater direction.

From 1994 he wrote for Puppets, a satirical puppet show on NTV that mocked Russian politicians until it ended in 2002. He also hosted the satirical program Total on NTV from 1997 to 2001 and on TV-6 in 2002. From 2003 to 2008 he ran a weekly program on the Echo of Moscow radio station, and from 2007 to 2020 he wrote a column for The New Times.

In 2005 he ran as an independent candidate in a Moscow by-election to the State Duma and came second with 17% of the vote, behind Stanislav Govorukhin with 38%. He described the campaign in a 2006 book. He criticized Putin's rule and the government's policy in the Chechen war of 1994 to 1996, signed the 2010 manifesto Putin Must Go, and helped organize the Moscow for Everyone rally in December 2010.

In November 2021 he applied for Israeli citizenship, and in December 2021 Russia's Ministry of Justice listed him as a foreign agent. He left Russia in January 2022 and settled in Poland. In June 2023 he was refused entry to Georgia on an Israeli passport, and in 2025 a Russian financial agency added him to its list of terrorists and radicals.