That was the narrative coming off this series of votes, which saw a union-backed opposition defeat the referendum in Del Norte County, even though the one in Tehama County passed.

The Shasta County supervisors voted down a Jefferson proposal last month too, but according to this letter in the Redding Record-Searchlight, the room wasn’t happy about it:

I went to the Shasta County Board of Supervisors meeting Tuesday morning and was very disappointed. The room was standing room only with supporters in favor of the State of Jefferson. Those in favor outnumbered opponents 7-to-1. The supervisors who voted against supporting the State of Jefferson movement said they haven’t seen any proof that such a state would be economically viable. How do you explain in three minutes something as complicated as dividing a state into two separate states?

This Tuesday, Sutter County’s board of supervisors is expected to adopt a resolution in support of Jefferson secession:

Interesting discussion was held by the Sutter Supervisors on Tuesday, July 8th, who all stated their frustration with the State of California and said they support the 51st State of Jefferson project. But the supervisors decided to write their own resolution regarding withdrawal from the state. So it will be during their July 22nd Board meeting, when they will finalize a resolution with a vote.

According to this article, the board is unanimous:

Each board member told the room packed with State of Jefferson advocates on Tuesday they supported withdrawal of North State counties from the rest of California.

So, no, it doesn’t really look like things have stalled at all.

Most of the local but not locally-owned papers will probably continue pushing the narrative that the movement is losing steam, though. The official position of the Scripps paper in Redding is that we don’t want to give another state to those nasty Republicans, and who would want to live in “Idaho. With beaches.” And the Medford Mail-Tribune just across the border in Oregon, owned by the Local Media Group, keeps wondering why southern Oregon has been pretty quiet so far. Sue Gallagher, a Democratic Party official in Tehama, has been waging a one-woman letter-writing campaign in the local papers against secession.

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In other news there is a Jefferson-themed Crossfit gym in Redding: