Statehood for D.C. facing long odds in Senate
WASHINGTON — Proponents of statehood for Washington, D.C., vowed Tuesday to keep pushing even though the prospects were dim as the bill began working its way through the Senate.
In Tuesday's hearings on a bill that would make Washington, D.C., the 51st state, Democrats framed it as a long-standing injustice finally being made right. The nation's capital has a larger population than Wyoming or Vermont, and its estimated 712,000 residents pay federal taxes, vote for president and serve in the armed forces, but they have no voting representation in Congress.
Republicans, however, dismissed the bill as a Democratic power play since the District votes solidly Democratic. They claim statehood was never the intention of the Founding Fathers and insist that Congress doesn't even have the power to change D.C.'s status. “What Congress cannot do is override the Constitution anytime it becomes inconvenient for a majority in Congress,” said Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri. “The Constitution endures and that is the fundamental premise of our Democratic republic, and I fear that premise is being threatened by this legislation.”
The bill proposes creating a 51st state with one representative and two senators, while a tiny sliver of land including the White House, the U.S. Capitol and the National Mall would remain as a federal district.
Instead of the District of Columbia, the new state would be known as Washington, Douglass Commonwealth — named after famed abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who lived in Washington from 1877 until his death in 1895.
This version of the legislation passed the House in April by a 216-208 vote along party lines, but the Senate is a long shot. The Senate is split 50-50 with Vice President Kamala Harris as the tie-breaker. Not long after the House vote, however, Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia essentially blunted whatever momentum that statehood had gathered by saying he opposed pursuing it through an act of Congress.
Even with Manchin's support the measure would be vulnerable to a filibuster.
