If casual observers of the wave of state-secession petitions hitting the White House since Election Day have learned nothing else, it’s that anyone can petition the White House for anything — even free pizza.
Every U.S. state is now represented by at least one petition on the Obama administration’s “We the People” Web page asking for permission to secede from the United States.
A backlash late Monday night saw requests to strip citizenship rights from petition signers. (RELATED: Anti-secession forces fight back with White House deportation petitions)
And a request hit the White House Tuesday from Austin, Texas citizens who want to secede from their state if Texas should become its own independent republic again. (RELATED: Austin progressives petition White House to secede from Texas)
Now one group of petitioners seems eager for one state — Missouri — to make its exit.
The “Justice for Missouri Secession” petition, launched Monday, asks the Obama administration to “grant the remaining United States of America a Pizza Party furnished by Pizza Hut and Papa Johns (unless he keeps laying off his workers) should the State of Missouri succeed with one or both of their petitions to the White House to Secede from the Union.”
Papa John’s founding CEO John Schnatter made news and incited boycott threats after Barack Obama was re-elected, by predicting that his pizza chain’s franchisees might control the costs of implementing the president’s Obamacare law by cutting employees’ hours and laying off workers.
The health care law adds new costs to operating a business with 50 or more employees, but its insurance coverage mandate applies only to workers who put in at least 30 hours per week. Papa John’s is based in Kentucky.
The petitioners seem to care less about which pizza chain provides the pies for a Missouri going-away party, though, and more about giving the state the permanent boot.
“As remaining loyal citizens of America, and to shove it in Missourians faces once they aren’t a part of the US any longer,” they wrote, “a Nationwide Pizza Party would reconcile differences, mend old wounds and bring together the nation.”
