Top 5 White House Petitions Since Website Began

In his final weeks in office, will President Obama finally sign onto a bid to create our own Death Star? Or how about deporting Justin Bieber? Those were two of some 5,000 petitions sent to the White House via the "We the People" site over the past five years, reports the Los Angeles Times. While most bids have gone nowhere, such as a pitch to recognize International Talk Like a Pirate Day, others resulted in presidential support for significant issues like state laws banning gay conversion therapy. An analysis by the Pew Research Center showed the most common petitions concerned health care (8%); disease awareness (6%); veterans’ issues (6%); immigration (5%); creating new holidays (5%); criminal investigations (5%); and animal rights (5%).

Here are the top five since the website launched in 2011:

1. "Legally recognize the Westboro Baptist Church as a hate group," 367,180 signatures.
2. "Establish justice and prevent a great catastrophe," 331,914 signatures. (This was over a conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, per Storify.)
3. "File charges against the 47 US senators in violation of the Logan Act in attempting to undermine a nuclear agreement," 322,117 signatures.
4. "Ask President Obama to appear on HBO’s ‘Real Time with Bill Maher,’" 314,226 signatures. (Obama did appear.)
5. "Deport Justin Bieber and revoke his green card," 273,698 signatures.

(More petitions stories.)