‘He’s Not Getting it Back’: State Department Responds to ‘Bogus’ Report About Putin Questioning Russia’s Sale of Alaska

The U.S. State Department on Monday responded to a question about an apparently fake report claiming that Russian President Vladimir Putin deemed the 1867 sale of Alaska to the U.S. “illegitimate.”

“Well, I think I can speak for all of us in the U.S. government to say that certainly he’s not getting it back,” State Department principal deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said in reply to a question from a reporter.

Patel was clearly surprised by the question and appeared to have no advanced knowledge of the decree from Putin, which makes sense as Snopes concluded it never happened.

“Social media users shared an alleged document signed by Putin, claiming that the sale of Alaska was not legitimate,” noted Snopes’s Aleksandra Wrona, who added, “The document did not, according to this translation, mention Alaska at any point, or state that Alaska or any other territory formerly owned by Russia was sold ‘illegally.’”

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev joked about the fake report and the State Department’s official response. “According to a State Department representative, Russia is not getting back Alaska, which was sold to the U.S. in the 19th century. This is it, then. And we’ve been waiting for it to be returned any day. Now war is unavoidable,” Medvedev wrote with a laughing emoji attached at the end.

Tensions remain high between the U.S. and Russia as Putin continues his brutal invasion of Ukraine and national security experts warn the Russian autocrat has his eye on reclaiming other territories that were once part of the Soviet Union or imperial Russia.