Georgia Rep. Andrew Clyde is already signaling that at least a faction of the House Republican conference in the upcoming Congress will try to yank power away from the District of Columbia.
The congressman told NOTUS he’s putting together legislation to “return exclusive legislative authority” to Congress. That would shrink the already limited power of the district to govern itself under Home Rule, a 1973 law that lets residents elect their own council members and mayor but still requires Congress to review legislation and to approve budgets.
“We have a lot of constitutional responsibilities. This is one of them. And we need to take it seriously,” Clyde told NOTUS about making and enforcing laws in D.C.
Clyde has long opposed D.C. autonomy, but he has reason to feel bullish now. With Republicans’ upcoming trifecta, they’ll have a lot more power, and President-elect Donald Trump has long expressed interest in wresting back control from D.C.
“We will take over our horribly run Washington, D.C.,” Trump said at a December 2023 rally, calling the nation’s capital “a nightmare of murder and crime.” The Trump transition team did not respond to a request for comment, but it was a theme Trump hit on repeatedly as he ran for his old job.
Republicans also stated in their party platform this year that they “will reassert greater federal control over Washington, D.C., to restore law and order in our capital city, and ensure federal buildings and monuments are well-maintained.”
Georgia Republican Rep. Rich McCormick, who has previously voted for changes to D.C. Home Rule and to overturn D.C. local voting laws, told NOTUS he would support more congressional control over the city, but that it’d have to be “for a particular reason, not just carte blanche.”
“We don’t have enough time in the day to manage this ridiculous city, which is 80% Democrats,” McCormick said. “That’s why I think it has so many problems, quite frankly. It’s lopsided, it’s not balanced and it’s not reasonable.”
Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.C.’s nonvoting delegate in Congress, did not respond to a request for comment. Mayor Muriel Bowser declined to comment but recently addressed threats to Home Rule at a Nov. 12 news conference.
“We’re still a country of laws, and the district has Home Rule, and the Congress could change it. They could. That is possible. That is probably … not a likely occurrence,” Bowser said. “What I think is important for all D.C. residents to recognize, we’re not in a new place. We’ve been in this place before, and what we’ve done is follow the law, and we defended ourselves and that would be our approach in any further occurrence.”
Republicans have inserted themselves into policy battles in the past. They blocked the city’s efforts to set up a recreational marijuana marketplace earlier this year, and for decades, Congress has prevented D.C. from using tax dollars to fund abortions through Medicaid with a rider on the city’s budget.
But the Republican Party’s biggest bone to pick is with the district’s crime policies, pointing to D.C. as an example of a crime-ridden, Democratic-controlled city in their broader case that they are the party of law and order.
Maryland Rep. Andy Harris, a vocal critic of Home Rule who has criticized the city’s handling of marijuana regulations for years, echoed Clyde’s concerns about crime in D.C. and told NOTUS he supported Trump’s many campaign promises to take federal control of the city.
“I think it’s a shame if you drive around D.C., it’s not a clean city; it’s not a safe city. I agree with President Trump that we probably oughta take back more control,” said Harris.
When asked whether he would support repealing the Home Rule Act, Harris said, “We should definitely look that over. We should make it much easier for Congress to take action when D.C. does stupid things like turning criminals loose.”
The D.C. Council passed a massive overhaul of its criminal code in early 2023 after Bowser had vetoed it. The Revised Criminal Code Act removed almost all mandatory minimum sentences and reduced many maximum sentences, but Congress blocked it from going into effect, a move that President Joe Biden and high-ranking Democrats, including Sen. Chuck Schumer, supported.
Not all Republicans are as eager to run with Trump’s promise to “take over” D.C.
Rep. Darrell Issa said he currently sees “a balance” of control between local officials and federal lawmakers and that he didn’t expect any changes, even though the GOP will soon control both chambers of Congress.
“I would not support any increases in Home Rule,” Issa said. “But we are the state to the city of the District of Columbia, and we have to have a similar balance that a good state has to its incorporated cities. I’ve always felt that way.”
When Issa chaired the House Oversight Committee, he granted more autonomy to the district. In 2013, he introduced a bill that would have given city officials more freedom to spend its revenue, and the next year, he also worked with D.C. officials to change federal law that governed how tall buildings in the city could be.
Issa said congressional changes to D.C. would be up to the House Oversight Committee, a panel Issa used to chair but is currently led by Rep. James Comer. Issa said Comer “takes it seriously,” referring to Congress’ oversight of D.C.
It’s unclear how much appetite there will be to modify or overturn the Home Rule Act in the next Congress. But a House Oversight spokesperson made it clear that the committee has kept an eye on local matters and has stepped in several times when deemed necessary.
“Chairman Comer is fully committed to fulfilling the Committee’s constitutional duty to oversee the nation’s capital and will continue to work to ensure the city is safe and prosperous for all Americans,” said Austin Hacker, a spokesperson for Comer and the House Oversight Committee. Hacker cited several city crime policies that this Congress blocked or pushed back on.
Some of Congress’ attempts to change Home Rule authority have failed. Last year, three GOP representatives introduced a one-sentence bill that would have repealed the Home Rule Act, but it did not make it out of the House Oversight Committee.
Clyde, who said his concerns stemmed from how city officials handle crime policies, didn’t provide many details about what his legislation would look like.
When NOTUS asked whether his bill would address policy around abortion access and marijuana regulations — hot-button issues that have previously come up in power struggles between D.C. and Congress — Clyde said, “You’ll find out.”
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Emily Kennard is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow.