State Duma member Alexey Ostrovsky was appointed acting Governor of Smolensk Oblast in April 2012 after the resignation of Sergey Antufyev.

In May 2015 Ostrovsky asked President Vladimir Putin for early resignation, he was immediately reappointed as acting Governor of Smolensk Oblast[2] and won September 2015 gubernatorial election with 65.2% of the vote.

[4] On 17 March 2023, unexpectedly for LDPR and most observers, Alexey Ostrovsky asked for resignation after serving more than 10 years in office.

President Putin approved the request and replaced Ostrovsky with Vasily Anokhin, Director of the Department of Regional Development at the Apparatus of the Government of Russia.

[5] Anokhin is viewed as ally of Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin, whose secretariat acting governor previously headed.