In 1991, after the Dissolution of the Soviet Union, President Boris Yeltsin appointed him as governor of Tomsk Oblast.

In 2007, President Vladimir Putin, who had ended the direct election of governors, nominated him for a fifth term, which he won by a vote of the Regional Duma.

On May 17, 2012, Kress' successor, Governor Sergey Zhvachkin, appointed him to the Federation Council as the representative of Tomsk Oblast.

He serves as the Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Science, Education, Culture and Information Policy.

Kress was sanctioned by the British government and the European Union in 2022 as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.