Eleanor Holmes Norton, Washington, D.C.’s sole nonvoting delegate in the House, vowed Friday she would push for a vote on statehood for the District of Columbia if Democrats win the House back in the midterm election.
“If in fact there is Democratic control, I will seek a vote on D.C. statehood,” she said on the House floor. “I got a vote on D.C. statehood when I first came to the Congress. It’s time to have another vote on DC statehood.”
The Constitution explicitly says the District of Columbia is not a state, and that Congress has the power to “exercise exclusive legislation in all cases whatsoever.”
But its residents for decades have complained that its designation doesn’t allow it to have a voting member in the House, or any representation at all in the Senate.
The House allows Norton to vote in committee, but not on the floor. Norton says that’s unfair, and essentially relegates a population that’s larger than two U.S. states to territorial status.
She said the population of Washington, D.C., is larger than the populations in Vermont and Wyoming, and is close in size to seven other states.
“The people I represent, 700,000 of them, are No. 1 in taxes paid to support the government of the United States,” she said.
“Yet they have no representation whatsoever in that body down the hall, the Senate of the United States,” Norton added. “In fact, I’m grateful that the House understands that I should vote in committee where most of the work is done, but when a bill comes to the House floor, even if that bill singularly effects the residents of the District of Columbia, every member of this body, except the member who represents the District of Columbia, can vote on that bill.”
“That is not justice, that is not American, and it gives, I think, the underlying reasons why the District of Columbia should become the 51st state of the union,” she said.
Democrats have an edge over Republicans in generic polls asking who people might vote for, but the latest polls are raising questions about whether a “blue wave” in November will allow Democrats to take back control of the House.
