Meet the western conservatives moving to Russia

Tofurious Maximus Crane was sitting in a barber’s chair in Moscow when he received the greatest news of his life. It was 19 August, the day Vladimir Putin signed a decree allowing foreigners to immigrate to Russia. Now, the 46-year-old native of Virginia Beach, Virginia, could finally achieve his life’s dream of remaining in Russia for ever. ‘For me, the decree is the best thing that ever happened in my life besides, you know, family and children,’ says Crane, a charismatic bear of an American who sports a long Old Testament beard and perfectly coiffed hipster hair. ‘I got the notification about the decree, and I jumped up out of the chair and was crying. I was very excited.’

Thanks to Putin’s decree, citizens from a list of ‘unfriendly’ western countries are officially welcome to immigrate to Russia as long as they share Russia’s ‘spiritual and moral values’. For Josef Schutzman, 39, originally from Dallas, Texas, Russia is a place where he and his growing family have found religious freedom and escape from the ‘liberal ideologies which have permeated through America… the US became untenable for me’.