{"id":461,"date":"2023-02-16T18:44:12","date_gmt":"2023-02-16T19:44:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/?p=461"},"modified":"2025-06-20T10:51:10","modified_gmt":"2025-06-20T10:51:10","slug":"moscow-based-mma-legend-gives-up-us-citizenship-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/2023\/02\/16\/moscow-based-mma-legend-gives-up-us-citizenship-media\/","title":{"rendered":"Moscow-based MMA legend gives up US citizenship \u2013 media"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Jeff Monson became a Russian citizen in 2018 and was elected to political office in Moscow Region<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>American-born mixed martial arts star Jeff Monson plans to renounce his US citizenship due to his disagreement with Washington\u2019s foreign policy, he told TASS on Thursday. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<em>I disagree with US policies because they interfere in the internal affairs of other countries and people suffer because of this<\/em>,\u201d said the legendary fighter, who was granted Russian citizenship in 2018.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<em>Yes, I have children living in the United States, but I love Russia, I love the Russian people<\/em>,\u201d he told the state news outlet, adding, \u201c<em>I like everything here and I want to be the holder of a Russian passport only.<\/em>\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\n        <span><strong>Read more<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<figure>\n            <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" alt=\"Monson has defended Russia\u2019s actions in Ukraine and Donbass. \u00a9 Kirill Kallinikov\" class=\"lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/02\/6324724820302769670dae5d.jpg\"><figcaption><a href=\"https:\/\/www.rt.com\/sport\/562937-jeff-monson-donbass-film\/\">Ex-UFC star discusses plans for Donbass film (VIDEO)<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>Only months after becoming a Russian citizen, Monson was elected as a deputy to the Council of Deputies of the Krasnogorsk district in Moscow Region. He remains a legislator for the region.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Nicknamed \u2018the Snowman\u2019, Monson has won 61 of his 90 fights. He is a former challenger for the Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight title and a two-time ADCC Submission Wrestling World Championship winner. In addition to MMA, he is also a Brazilian Jiu-jitsu world champion. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>An enthusiast of Russian and Soviet culture who has said he has a \u201c<em>Russian soul<\/em>,\u201d Monson was granted honorary citizenship of the breakaway Republic of Abkhazia in 2016 and received a passport in 2017 to what was then the self-declared Lugansk People\u2019s Republic. He recently filmed and edited a documentary about \u201c<em>the people of Donbass<\/em>\u201d and in September revealed he planned to open sports schools in the Donetsk People\u2019s Republic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jeff Monson became a Russian citizen in 2018 and was elected to political office in Moscow Region American-born mixed martial [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":465,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461\/revisions\/465"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/marinemalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}