In a 2021 letter to independent journalist Yevgenia Albats, he contemplated death: “It’s a historical process. Russia is going through it, and we are coming along together. We’ll make it (probably). I am all right, and I have no regrets. And you shouldn’t, either, and shouldn’t worry. Everything will be OK. And, even if it isn’t, we’ll have the consolation of having lived honest lives.”
In prison, Navalny communicated mostly through his lawyers, who posted the notes Navalny passed them to his social media platforms. He often used the phrase, “Everything will be OK.” This may sound like a throwaway line, but it wasn’t: He was trying to communicate that everything would be OK even if he wasn’t.
It is hard to believe that everything will be OK now. Putin, who has sought to bring Russia into an imaginary past, has caused the death of the politician who symbolized a different Russian future. Donald Trump, who also practices the politics of returning to an imaginary past, is fueling congressional opposition to aiding Ukraine, which is running out of ammunition in its fight to stave off an aggressive war against Russia. (From prison, Navalny spoke out against the full-scale invasion the day it began.)