The Calexit movement has opened its own "embassy" in Moscow in what organizers say is the next step in the effort to have California secede from the United States.
California secession interest has picked up since Donald Trump's election last month, reported CNN, noting that Hillary Clinton received about 60 percent of the state's presidential vote.
San Diego resident Louis Marinelli, currently working as an English teacher in Russia, organized the "people's embassy" event and promoted it on social media, reported the Los Angeles Times
The movement's Yes California website called the office its "people's embassy" and cultural center that will "serve to build a bridge between the nation of California and the nations of the world." The website suggested that it will open similar centers in other countries.
"Our campaign understands that California cannot become a country unilaterally," Yes California said. "As much as that applies to constitutional law within the United States whereby we must obtain the consent of the states, it also applies to international law within the international community whereby we must obtain international recognition of our independence."
"Our new 'people's embassy' in Moscow will begin this new front by opening this important and critical dialogue with Russia, and future-planned embassies in other countries will continue that dialogue in other parts of the world."
"As the sixth largest economy in the world, California is more economically powerful than France and has a population larger than Poland," organizers said last month, noted CNN. "Point-by-point, California compares and competes with countries, not just the 49 other states."
A group in Texas has also been pushing for that state to exit the United States, an effort which the Washington Post said has been gaining steam among Republicans over the past eight years. In May, an effort to force a floor vote on secession at the Texas Republican Party convention fell two votes short.
The Texas Tribune said Texas played a role in solving the question fo whether states can actually secede. In 1869, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Texas v. White that individual states could not unilaterally secede from the country and acting to do so was illegal.
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