Actor and Putin Enthusiast Steven Seagal Joins Pro-Kremlin Political Party

(Photo by Clive Mason/Getty Images)

Actor, friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Russian citizen Steven Seagal has joined a pro-Kremlin political party, according to an announcement from the party itself.

The party, called A Just Russia – Patriots – For Truth released a video Saturday, in which Seagal received a membership card from the group. The party, which formed earlier this year, is an alliance of three leftist parties, all of which support Putin. It reportedly controls a faction in the lower house of the Russian parliament, and plans to participate in a parliamentary election in September, according to a report by The Guardian.

In a welcome speech, Seagal proposed tough penalties for business that damage the environment.

“Without being able to arrest people, when we just fine them, they are probably making more money off the production of the things that are defiling the environment,” Seagal said, according to the Guardian report.

Seagal also posed for pictures with one of the party leaders, Russia writer Zakhar Prilepin, who fought with pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, the Guardian reported.

Putin, a fan of Seagal’s martial arts-heavy action movies, granted Russian citizenship to the actor in 2016, personally giving him a Russian passport. In 2018, Seagal was appointed as a special envoy to the U.S.

Seagal has also faced multiple sexual assault allegations in the U.S.

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