Political career of Vladimir Putin personally congratulated Putin on his victory, calling Putin "a driving force behind strategic ties of cooperation between Venezuela and Russia." Anti-Putin protests took place during and directly after the presidential campaign. The most notorious protest was the 21 February Pussy Riot performance, and subsequent trial. Also, an estimated 8,000-20,000 protesters gathered in Moscow on 6 May, when eighty people were injured in confrontations with police, and 450 were arrested, with another 120 arrests taking place the following day. Putin was inaugurated in the Kremlin on 7 May 2012. On his first day as President, Putin issued 14 Presidential decrees, including
Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections not take action at that time; he also invited all the children of the U.S. diplomats accredited in Russia to New Year's and Christmas celebrations at the Kremlin. The statement went on to say that further steps for restoring Russian-American relations would be built on the basis of the policies developed by the Trump administration. In May 2017, Russian banker Andrey Kostin, an associate of President Vladimir Putin, said the Washington elite was purposefully disrupting the presidency of Donald Trump. In mid-July 2017, the Russian foreign ministry said that the staff of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow far exceeded the