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The U.S. House of Representatives has passed a historic bill that would allow Washington DC to be admitted as the 51st state and give the nation’s capital full representation in Congress.
The Washington DC Admissions Act passed the House of Democrats throughout the party on Thursday, 216-208, in a victory for Democratic lawmakers who say residents of the nation’s capital have no fair representation in Congress.
But the bill is probably dead on arrival in the upper house, which would make it the last on a list of progressive priorities, including stricter gun laws i comprehensive voting reforms, with little chance of overcoming the Republican opposition to become law.
Democrats control both the House and Senate, but filibuster rules require the support of 60 senators in the 100-member upper house in order to advance a bill, an obstacle that is difficult to remove when the Senate splits between 50 and 50 between Democrats and Republicans. .
Joe Biden, the president of the United States, has been reluctant to accept the calls of progressives for Democrats to reject the filibuster. Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona have also said they were against getting rid of it.
The state of DC has long been a famous cause for progressives and residents in the nation’s capital, where about half the population is African American and voters are more likely to choose Democrats than Republicans. Republicans say the move would violate the constitution and accuse Democrats of launching a power outage to increase their numbers on Capitol Hill.
The U.S. Constitution allowed for the creation of a federal district and the 23rd Amendment, passed in 1961, gave the city three votes from the Electoral College in the presidential election.
But Washington DC has never had voting representation in Congress, despite having more than 700,000 residents (more than Vermont and Wyoming) and paying more in federal taxes per capita than any state.
District vehicle license plates carry the slogan “End taxation without representation,” echoing the American Revolution’s “No Taxation Without Representation.”
The city is represented in the House by Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Democrat who is a non-voting delegate. It has no senators.
Norton first introduced a bill to turn Washington into a state nearly three decades ago, in 1993. That measure failed, 277-153, gaining the support of less than half of Democrats and only one Republican.
However, support for turning the capital into the 51st state has grown in recent years, both among lawmakers and among the general public. The cause has gained momentum in recent months alongside the Black Lives Matter movement, as well as Democratic victories in regaining the White House and Senate. Last year, the House passed a similar state measure who died in the Senate, then under Republican control.
Public opinion polls show that Americans are divided on the issue. A Fortune survey in January, it was found that 49% of Americans were in favor of the state of DC, while 45% were opposed.
Republican lawmakers, including Mitt Romney and Adam Kinzinger, have in recent weeks suggested alternatives to full statehood, including the absorption of Washington DC into neighboring Maryland, or the possibility of Norton becoming a voting member of the House. .
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