Photo by Bullneck

If you happened to catch the inauguration of Mayor Muriel Bowser, attorney general Karl Racine, and the new Councilmembers, then you know how often “reviving the D.C. statehood movement” was mentioned in the new officials’ speeches. If not, spoiler alert: A lot.

And on Meet The Press yesterday, when pressed by host Chuck Todd about joining Maryland or Virginia, Bowser replied firmly “we are Washington, D.C., Chuck.” Could 2015 be the year of D.C. statehood? Well, it’s going to take some serious legwork at the federal level, which is why there’s an official White House petition circulating that urges President Barack Obama to advocate for D.C. statehood in the next State of the Union address, which will happen on January 20.

“The 660,000 Americans citizens who live in the District of Columbia fulfill all obligations of citizenship but are denied the most basic rights of citizenship: the right to full and equal congressional representation & the right to be the arbiters of our local affairs,” the petition, which, at the time of writing, only has 78 signatures since it went live yesterday. Here’s the rest of the petition’s language:

Simple legislation would make the District the 51st state in the union. We urge President Obama take the statehood cause directly to Congress & the American people by advocating for D.C. statehood in his State of the Union speech. This cause is a moral cause and we ask President Obama to embrace it and advocate for it thus emboldening a cause that would ensure that the people of the District of Columbia are finally treated fairly and equally as citizens in the 51st state in the union.

As the rule with official White House petitions state, the White House has to issue an official response if more than 100,000 signatures are acquired.