Dems want to make D.C. 51st state

A 51st star could be coming soon to an American flag near you if congressional Democrats get their way.

Democrats in the House of Representatives plan a vote June 26 on admitting Washington, D.C., as the nation’s 51st state, a push that has rapidly gained momentum amid the racial justice protests sweeping the nation.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi called the fact that D.C. is not a state “unjust, unequal, undemocratic and unacceptable.”

Washington Mayor Muriel Bowser (inset) says statehood for the District is a civil rights issue for black Americans, who make up a plurality of the roughly 700,000 people who live there.

The bill faces certain death in the Republican-controlled Senate, and President Trump has vowed to veto it. But a powerful mandate in the House could set the stage for a victory if Democrats win control of the Senate and the White House.

The move would mean Democratic-dominated D.C., which is more populous than the states of Wyoming and Vermont, would get one representative and two senators.

The District would also have a governor, who would have significantly more power over D.C. than the mayor does now.

Statehood for D.C. has somewhat surprisingly never won much traction among Democrats. The last time the issue came for a vote was in 1993, when Democrats controlled the House and Senate. It failed by a 2-to-1 margin. But the protests over the police killing of George Floyd have significantly shifted the politics of the issue.

Trump, wildly unpopular in the District, earned the ire of Bowser and others by using National Guard and other federal troops to disperse peaceful protesters. Statehood advocates point to that as a sign of the current system’s unfairness.

Statehood foes deny any racial or partisan motivation for keeping D.C. from becoming the 51st state.