Zelenskyy’s Inner Circle Engulfed by Ukraine’s Largest Graft Scandal

Volodymyr Zelenskyy won the presidency in 2019 on a promise to break Ukraine’s oligarchic cycle of graft. Seven years later, the largest corruption case of his tenure runs directly through his own office — implicating his former chief of staff, a deputy chief of staff, two ministers, and a business partner who fled the country hours before investigators arrived. The scandal, centered on the state nuclear operator Energoatom, has become less a story about stolen money than a test of whether Ukraine’s wartime state can still police itself.

Ukraine’s National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) says the scheme extracted roughly $100 million through kickbacks of 10 to 15 percent on Energoatom supplier contracts. The alleged architect, Timur Mindich — Zelenskyy’s former business partner and a co-owner of his Kvartal 95 production company — left Ukraine the day before raids hit 70 locations nationwide. What followed was not a quiet resignation but a cascade: Chief of Staff Andriy Yermak, effectively Zelenskyy’s second-in-command, stepped down and was later charged; Justice Minister Herman Halushchenko and Energy Minister Svitlana Grynchuk resigned within days; and this month brought fresh charges against deputy chief of staff Iryna Mudra.

The president’s defiant tone sits uneasily against his own record on the bureau now leading the investigation. In July 2025, Zelenskyy moved to strip NABU of its independence by subordinating it to a prosecutor general he himself appoints — a step anti-corruption groups and Western partners read as an attempt to blunt the very probe now consuming his inner circle. He reversed course only after street protests in Kyiv and pressure from allies. That episode, more than any single official’s downfall, is what critics point to when arguing the scandal is a test of institutions, not just individuals.

Zelenskyy himself has not been charged, and under Ukrainian law a sitting president cannot be — only impeached on the strength of evidence. Leaked recordings have raised questions about a phone call he allegedly made after being contacted by Mindich, though what was discussed remains unconfirmed. Political rivals, including former president Petro Poroshenko and Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko, have seized on the fallout to press for greater oversight of a wartime cabinet that has already lost two ministers to the affair — with the anti-corruption bureau’s next moves likely to determine how much further the scandal climbs.