Secession movements have dotted the American landscape for a long time. While the Confederacy was the only secession movement that had any traction, most of these movements were quixotic at best and laughable at worst.
There’s a new secession effort on the horizon, and just like the Confederates of the mid-19th century, Democrats are behind it. Newsweek reports that California’s secretary of state has given the green light to a movement to gather signatures for a petition to put California’s secession from the U.S. on the ballot in 2028.
The reason for this movement is exactly what you would expect.
“Calexit, a group that campaigns for Californian independence, described Trump's presidential election win in November as ‘an attack on everything California cares about’ and argued that it strengthened the state's case for secession,” writes Newsweek’s James Bickerton.
The report explains the logistics behind the petition:
On Thursday, Weber announced that the independence petition initiative, which [Marcus] Evans launched from Fresno, could begin collecting signatures.
To have an independence vote included on California's 2028 election ballot, campaigners must gather 546,651 signatures—constituting 5 percent of the total votes cast for Governor Gavin Newsom in November 2022—and submit them to county elections officials by July 22, 2025.
The question proposed by the campaign is "Should California leave the United States and become a free and independent country?"
According to the campaign, if at least 50 percent of registered Californian voters cast their ballots, and at least 55 percent of participants vote "yes," it would constitute "a vote of no confidence in the United States of America" and an "expression of the will of the people of California" to become an independent state.
"Californians did not put their full faith and trust behind the Calexit option in 2016,” Calexit posted on its website on November 6. “Now it is 2024, and Trump is back, and he will come with even more tools and skill and supporters than last time. Do we need to wait until 2028 to realize that this is the trajectory of the country we share borders with [sic]."
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The most obvious problem with this potential ballot question is that the Calexit movement may be as foolish as the other movements that have dotted the landscape of American history. California may not even have the ability to divorce itself from the union, according to the Constitution.
“The U.S. Constitution does not include a mechanism for state secession,” Bickerton writes. “In 1869, following the Civil War, the Supreme Court ruled that the act of admitting a state into the Union was final, with ‘no place for reconsideration, or revocation except through revolution, or through consent of the states.’"
There’s a part of me that wants to say, “Let them try it.” Sure, California may be the fifth-largest economy in the world, but its commitment to wokeness and extreme environmentalism isn’t doing any favors for its long-term economic outlook. Californians are leaving the state in droves, which doesn’t bode well. We’ve seen the state’s response to the fires in Los Angeles and San Diego, and that makes it hard to see how California can manage its affairs as an independent nation.
At the same time, we have a long time to wait for this initiative — if it makes the ballot at all. The Calexit folks have nearly a year and a half to gather the signatures, and it’ll be Election Day 2028 before the measure goes before the voters. That’s a long time for Trump’s policies to benefit Californians and shake them out of their willful blindness.
Modern secession movements are frivolous. There’s no guarantee that Calexit could gain enough steam to pass, and even if it does, the state may not be constitutionally able to see it through. But let these lefties run their mouths and waste their time, cash, and effort.
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