House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., announced his support for Washington D.C. statehood.
Hoyer’s announcement came in a column posted Thursday on The Washington Post website.
“Our founders, who prescribed the creation of a national capital not within the jurisdiction of any individual state, never intended for those living in it to be denied representation,” he said.
“For 228 years, our government has denied them that voice. More than 700,000 Americans remain unable to cast votes for an equal voice in Congress.”
Hoyer acknowledged he has been hesitant in the past to support statehood for D.C.
But he added: “I now believe the only path to ensuring its representation is through statehood.”
He noted Americans living in D.C. “have been denied not only a member with full voting rights in the House of Representatives but also two Senators – simply because of where they live.”
“Eleanor Holmes Norton, the non-voting delegate from the District in the House, has introduced a bill to admit the District as a state, and I will cosponsor it,” he said.
The Post noted that Hoyer had been the last Democratic federal lawmaker in the capital region who did not support statehood for the district.
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