Abstract
This article examines the delegitimization strategies employed by Russian bot networks in constructing the image of U.S. President Joe Biden on the VKontakte platform. Drawing on a unique corpus of 48,000 bot-generated messages (2019–2024), the study employs natural language processing, sentiment analysis, and topic modeling to uncover the rhetorical, lexical, and thematic features of astroturfing discourse. The findings reveal a systematic pattern of “low-threshold rhetorical toxicity”, in which irony, infantilization, and cognitive stigmatization are used to simulate grassroots discontent while avoiding overt aggression. The figure of Biden is strategically deconstructed into a symbol of weakness, senility, and geopolitical threat. This campaign functions not only to undermine a specific political actor but to reinforce broader anti-Western and pro-authoritarian narratives. The analysis contributes to understanding how digital propaganda produces simulated public opinion through coordinated, affectively loaded micro-discourses embedded within controlled information ecosystems.