Norton Releases Remarks Ahead of Press Conference on Continuing Resolution
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) released her remarks ahead of today’s press conference with D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson about the House Republican-drafted continuing resolution (CR), which she said amounts to “fiscal sabotage” of D.C.
The CR omitted a provision allowing D.C. to continue to spend under its locally-enacted fiscal year 2025 (FY 25) budget levels, effectively repealing the FY 25 budget D.C. has been spending under, which would lead to projected cuts of $1 billion. Norton filed an amendment at the Rules Committee to add the provision back in. The CR also omitted a provision Norton has gotten included since 2015 to exempt D.C. from a federal government shutdown, which Norton’s amendment would also correct. The Rules Committee meets to consider the bill at 4:00 p.m. today.
Norton’s remarks follow, as prepared for delivery.
Remarks of Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC)
Press Event on Continuing Resolution, March 10th, 2025
House Republicans released the text of a continuing resolution this weekend that commits nothing less than fiscal sabotage of D.C.. It is their latest blow in an escalating war on D.C., D.C. residents, and the limited home rule D.C. currently possesses.
The CR omitted a longstanding provision that would allow D.C. to continue spending under its local fiscal year 2025 budget, and instead treats D.C. as a federal agency, forcing the District to revert to spending at fiscal year 2024 levels for the remainder of the year. If enacted, the CR would result in projected cuts of one billion dollars ($1 billion), which would force dramatic reductions in essential services the city provides, including D.C. Police, EMS and schools. It is contrary to the stated Republican goal of improving public safety, law and order in the nation’s capital, and would in fact have the opposite effect. D.C. has not been treated as a federal agency for funding purposes in more than 20 years precisely because Republicans of a different generation recognized the disastrous effects this causes. Congress should keep its hands off D.C.
D.C. is not a federal agency. The omissions constitute a dramatic escalation in the Republican effort to undermine what small measure of democracy and autonomy the more than 700,000 residents of the nation’s capital currently have.
Republicans have introduced bills in both chambers of Congress to repeal the Home Rule Act, which aim to abolish the D.C. Council and Mayor’s office, leaving D.C. to depend on members of Congress elected by other jurisdictions to run the District.
The Revolutionary War was fought to give consent to the governed and to end taxation without representation. The Republican efforts towards a federal government takeover of D.C. run counter to this history. D.C.’s population is larger than that of two states, D.C. pays more federal taxes per capita than any state and more than 21 states overall. D.C. residents have fought and died in all this nation’s wars.
We deserve statehood, the only measure that would bring D.C. equality with the states and fully protect D.C. residents from this type of disastrous congressional interference.
The House of Representatives passed the D.C. statehood bill in 2020, the first time in history either chamber of Congress had passed the bill. The House passed it again in 2021. When Norton reintroduced the statehood bill on the first day of this Congress, she did so with 159 original cosponsors, the most original cosponsors of any bill introduced that first day. The bill now has 179 cosponsors. The Senate version, introduced by Senator Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), was introduced this Congress with 40 original cosponsors, and now has 41 cosponsors.
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