DC mayor warns of ‘slippery slope’ with Congress’s ‘meddling’

D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) said that she did not want Congress “meddling” in the city’s affairs after President Biden said he would be willing to sign a Republican-led resolution overturning a crime bill passed by the city.

“I will never say that we want the Congress meddling in the affairs of the District of Columbia,” Bowser told “Meet the Press NOW.” “That’s a slippery slope, again, that we endure not just with bills like this. We have a lot of issues to overcome with limited home rule.”

Although Bowser opposed the crime bill, issuing a veto that was overridden by the city council, she and other Democrats were blindsided by the president’s decision to not veto the Republican-backed resolution to block the new crime law. Proponents of D.C. statehood saw Biden’s decision as a slight to the movement, for which he has voiced support in the past.

“Unfortunately, we live with the indignity of limited home rule in this in the District of Columbia,” Bowser said during Friday’s interview. “We’re taxpaying Americans. We’re in the shadow of the Capitol, but we don’t have two senators. We don’t have a vote. And we’ve been working for decades to change that. And until we become a state, we live with this process.”

The crime bill, which would have eliminated most mandatory sentences and lowered penalties for violent offenses such as carjackings and robberies, drew the ire of Republicans and some moderate Democrats. As GOP lawmakers put the pressure on Biden to either nix the city bill or allow it to stand — risking a soft-on-crime image entering the 2024 presidential campaign — most Democrats expected Biden to veto the Republican resolution.

House Democrats pointed out that the White House issued a Statement of Administration Policy that said it opposed the Republican push to block the bill and backed D.C. But in a swift turn, Biden told Senate Democrats late last week that he would not veto GOP resolution, sparking outrage from a number of Democrats.

“DC has a right to govern itself, like any other state or municipality,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) said on Twitter. “If the President supports DC statehood, he should govern like it.”

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