Joe Biden Unexpectedly Wades Back Into the D.C. Statehood Fight
The White House’s quiet campaign to tweak the D.C. Admission Act also provides the first hint that the president is open to reforming the Electoral College.
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
Like the city itself, the push to grant Washington, D.C., autonomy and federal representation through statehood remains in an interminable limbo. While President Biden and most Democrats in Congress have backed statehood, the Admission Act, which passed the House a second time last month, stands no chance of moving through the Senate unless pivotal Democrats like Joe Manchin back the bill in substance, as well as the elimination of the legislative filibuster.
By Eddie Zipperer
THE WHITE HOUSE recently issued a statement endorsing a bill that would grant statehood to Washington, D.C. It said, âFor far too long, the more than 700,000 people of Washington D.C. have been deprived of full representation in the U.S. Congress. This taxation without representation and denial of self-governance is an affront to the democratic values on which our nation was founded.â
The bill (H.R. 51) takes a scalpel to D.C. and cuts away certain federal buildings such as the Capitol, the White House, and the Supreme Court, as well as other federal buildings and monuments. It then sets those areas aside as âthe seat of government.â
Kyrsten Sinema and Mark Kelly have boldly gone where few Arizonans from their party have gone before.Â
Their joint membership in the âWorldâs Most Exclusive Clubâ marks the first time since 1953 that the Grand Canyon State has been represented in the Senate by a pair of Democrats.
Senator Sinemaâs unconventional fashion choices began a âbuzzâ upon her arrival, but she followed a conventional political path to the Upper Chamber.Â
Thatâs not the case for her new Arizona colleague.
Like John Glenn and Jack Schmitt before him, Mark Kellyâs path to the Senate was âout of this world:â to stay there, Historyâs third astronaut-turned-senator must continue to defy political gravity.
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