Leader of Calexit campaign withdraws secession petition, seeks permanent home in progressive Russia

Brett T. | 10:09 PM on April 17, 2017

As Twitchy reported, anti-Trump Californians launched their campaign to secede from the United States back in November, with a group called the Yes California Independence Campaign submitting a petition that would have citizens heading to the polls in May 2019.

The president of Yes California was pulling the strings from quite a distance; Louis Marinelli was operating out of an office in Moscow rather than “occupied California,” as he calls it.

The secessionist "California Embassy" in Moscow hasn't tweeted in almost two months. Bummer. pic.twitter.com/fjmOC5wP0q

— Casey Michel ?? (@cjcmichel) April 17, 2017

Absence from California hasn’t made his heart grow fonder, it seems, and now he’s petitioning Russia to let him stay as a permanent resident, if they’ll have him.

The leader of the Calexit campaign, Louis Marinelli, just announced he's settling in Russia permanently & withdrawing his ballot petition. pic.twitter.com/zHwtUjcm5p

— Natasha Bertrand (@NatashaBertrand) April 17, 2017

If only Americans hadn’t been so xenophobic, the shame he felt from bringing his wife here might not have driven the entire secession effort:

Throughout this campaign, I have been primarily motivated by a personal struggle I have had with the United States government since 2012. That personal struggle revolved around the immigration status of my wife, a foreign national who I brought to the United States to live believing at the time that it was the best country in the world. For years, our marriage suffered as politicians in Washington argued and bickered about immigration reform while the American people expressed their anti-immigrant xenophobia.

For years, our family, like so many other families in California, suffered without the relief of comprehensive immigration reform. Unable to work, study, or travel internationally, and forced to live each day with the possibility of deportation, my wife was forced to live in the shadows. At times, it was difficult for me to even look at her, ashamed for what I had done, putting her in that situation, simply by bringing her to this country.