Cosplaying as D.C. Council, House Republicans advance dozen-plus bills targeting city they don’t represent

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on Wednesday passed a slew of bills targeting D.C., ranging from a measure that would allow President Trump to appoint the city’s attorney general (currently elected by residents) to a proposal prohibiting the city from using its traffic cameras to ticket scofflaw motorists.

The majority of the 14 bills that were approved touch on D.C.’s criminal justice laws, ratcheting up mandatory minimum sentences for certain violent offenses and allowing more juvenile offenders to be tried as adults – while at the same time undoing a 2020 law that imposed additional disciplinary measures on police.

The best D.C. residents may have gotten out of the marathon hearing was a bill that will allow the D.C. Council to email its bills to Congress, instead of having to hand-deliver them. (Seriously.)

The session took place on the final day of President Trump’s 30-day takeover of the Metropolitan Police Department, indicating that while one form of federal control was coming to an end, a new form of interference was just getting started. 

Republicans said they were simply fulfilling their constitutional duty to oversee the nation’s capital at a time when public safety was a concern. Democrats, however, repeatedly countered that the majority was enmeshing itself in plainly local issues – and without having to consult with or be held accountable by the residents who have to live with the changes. (There were no prior public hearings on the bills.)

“The D.C. Council has 13 members. If residents do not like how they vote, residents can vote them out of office or pass a ballot measure. That is called democracy. Congress has 535 members. None are elected by D.C. residents," said D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton. "That is the antithesis of democracy.”

Republicans clearly disagreed. Below is a summary of all the bills the committee advanced, which will next move to the full House.

A MAGA attorney general for D.C.?

What limited democracy D.C. residents enjoy could be shrinking. Under a bill that cleared the committee, Trump would gain the authority to unilaterally choose D.C.’s attorney general (without Senate confirmation, to boot). This would effectively give him almost absolute power over enforcement of the city’s criminal and civil laws (some of which have been turned against Trump himself).

Rep. James Comer (R-Kentucky) backed the bill, saying that the city’s attorney general “must operate free from local politics.” But Democrats pushed back, noting that the Trump-appointed attorney general would instead be operating under the influence of national politics despite the majority of the office’s work being plainly local.

“The D.C. Attorney General, as the District’s chief law officer, is responsible for local legal issues, namely, protecting the District and its residents in a wide range of matters, such as enforcing child support laws, handling abuse and neglect proceedings in the child welfare system, enforcing our housing code, and defending District agencies and officers when they are sued,” said Attorney Brian Schwalb in a letter to the committee. “In no other place in the United States are such local issues determined by a federally appointed person with no local accountability.”

Were Trump to gain this power, Democrats said certain local crimes may never get prosecuted. Just this week, Schwalb filed a lawsuit against a company that provides Bitcoin ATMs that he said scammed senior citizens out of money; would Trump, himself close to the crypto industry, have allowed such a lawsuit to proceed? Would Trump, a real estate developer at heart, permit his attorney general to sue slumlords the way Schwalb has? What of the successful 2020 lawsuit against the Trump Organization, which netted D.C. a $750,000 settlement? Would that ever have happened?

Should this bill become law, D.C. would join only seven other states that do not have a popularly elected attorney general. And even in many of those states, the responsibility is still left to the governor or legislature – positions that are elected by the people. For decades, D.C.’s attorney general was chosen by the mayor, an arrangement that raised questions about the office’s independence. In 2010, 76% of D.C. voters approved changing the position to one elected by residents; the first popular election happened in 2014.

Still, bill sponsor Rep. Pat Fallon (R-Texas) said the measure would increase D.C. oversight, and improve public safety because, as he said: “In recent years, D.C. saw close to two-thirds of arrests go unprosecuted.” 

But Fallon had confused the D.C. Attorney General for the U.S. Attorney for D.C., the latter of which is already appointed by the president and prosecutes most violent crime in the city – and in 2022 was accused of declining to prosecute 67% of arrests brought by MPD. (The D.C. attorney general does prosecute juvenile crime and minor adult offenses.) 

“D.C. laws should not be written by people who don't know how D.C. actually works,” tweeted Schwalb. 

More time for Congress to interfere in local lawmaking

Under the 50-year-old Home Rule Act that gave D.C. an elected mayor and council, Congress gave itself the right to review – and possibly reject – any bill passed by the council. It has 30 days to do so, or 60 days if the legislation touches on criminal law.

But a bill from Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Arizona) would expand the review period to 60 days for all bills, as well as give Congress expanded power to veto provisions of local legislation, mayoral orders, and regulations. Gosar said Congress needs more time: “This is a unique city. You chose to live in it,” he said. “There needs to be accountability.”

Rep. Robert Garcia (D-California), the ranking Democrat on the committee, countered that the bill would mean “more congressional micromanagement and more meddling in the democratic process." Others were more blunt, saying it would create “chaos” in local governance.

The bill, warned D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson, would “grind government functions in the District to a halt,” while Mayor Muriel Bowser said it would make the city less efficient, competitive, and responsive. “Bogging down legislative and executive action only adds costs and uncertainty,” she wrote to members of Congress ahead of Wednesday’s votes. 

A main concern is that the existing congressional review period already stretches far beyond its allotted time frame, largely because only weekdays or days when Congress is in session are counted towards the deadline. A bill passed by the council earlier this year banning female genital mutilation, for example, was subject to a 60-day review because it amended criminal law, but the actual review took twice as long as that. 

But bills can now be emailed to Congress!

Before the congressional review period can even start, the council has to transmit bills it passes to Congress. But that process hasn’t evolved much with technology: The bills are still required to be hand-delivered to multiple offices in the House and Senate. 

That seemed innocently old-timey enough until a few years ago, when such deliveries were literally blocked by the fencing placed around the U.S. Capitol in the wake of the Jan. 6 insurrection. (Some 60 bills passed by the council were held up until a workaround could be found.) Norton has since been pushing for Congress to allow for bills to be emailed instead, and committee Republicans seemed to want to grant her at least that – the vote on the measure was unanimous and bipartisan. (Email: It can unify America.)

Making it easier to prosecute juveniles as adults

If there is any issue that has long bedeviled public safety debates in D.C., it’s what to do with juveniles who break the law. Crimes committed by juveniles spiked during the pandemic, driven largely by carjackings but also extending into homicides – where kids were both perpetrators and victims. 

The number of crimes committed by juveniles has since fallen to below pre-pandemic levels, but local officials have still responded by creating a new unit in MPD to focus on juvenile crime and instituting an expanded youth curfew. Still, youth crime has become a point of emphasis for Trump and Republicans, who say that more juveniles should be treated like adults when they break the law.

One bill would do just that, allowing prosecutors to charge 14- and 15-year-olds as adults for certain violent crimes. Currently, that can only happen for kids who are 16 or 17. That point may be one where congressional Republicans and D.C. residents find some common ground. According to a Washington Post poll conducted last month, 58% of residents say that 14- and 15-year-old charged with murder should face the same consequences as adults. Support for charging children as adults, however, drops for other crimes, including carjackings and assaults. 

Another bill would make changes to the Youth Rehabilitation Act, a longstanding D.C. law that offers alternatives to jail, such as therapy or educational rehabilitation, for some juvenile offenders. The law was expanded to offenders up to the age of 24, but Republicans want it brought back down to 18. 

“If the D.C. Council will not do what is necessary and appropriate to ensure that the nation’s capital is safe, then it is a requirement of Congress to do so,” said Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Florida). 

But Garcia pushed back: “If D.C. residents don’t like their policies, they can vote for new policies or representatives. Our committee is not talking about violent crime in Louisiana or Mississippi or Alabama,” said Garcia. “We continue to take away the rights of the elected officials that represent this community.”

Increasing mandatory minimum sentences

Beyond juveniles, Republicans say that what D.C. needs is more deterrence – and that there’s no better tool than longer prison sentences. 

A bill written by Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Arizona) would increase mandatory minimums for a variety of crimes, from first-degree murder (currently 30 years or more to life imprisonment with no parole) to rape (currently seven to 25 years). Many of the new minimum sentences would also apply to juveniles. “What do greater sentences do? They provide specific and general deterrence,” he said.

But Garcia said that is far too simplistic. 

“There is no evidence that mandatory minimums actually significantly reduce crime rates,” he said. “Research instead points to the conclusion that it is the certainty of punishment, not the severity, that actually deters crime.”

Relatedly, the committee also passed a bill that would repeal a D.C. law that allows incarcerated felons who committed violent crimes before turning 25 and have served 15 years in prison to petition a judge for early release, and also another bill that allows certain offenders to request that their criminal records be sealed.

More pretrial detention, and a return of cash bail

A related bill from Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-New York) would mandate pretrial detention for anyone charged with a violent offense. 

If this issue sounds familiar, it’s because local lawmakers have been similarly debating it in recent years. Eventually, the council settled on giving judges more discretion in deciding when people charged with certain violent crimes can be held pending trial. Stefanik’s bill, though, would remove that discretion altogether. Existing data shows that 92% of those released pending trial do not reoffend, and for those who do, they rarely commit another violent crime.

“No one on this committee wants dangerous people on the streets after they have been arrested,” said Garcia, adding that D.C. law was similar to federal law. "Decisions are based on an assessment by a judge of a defendant's risk of flight and danger to the community. And that’s how it should be. In our system you are innocent until proven guilty.”

Stefanik’s bill would also bring back cash bail – which hasn’t been used in D.C. for 30 years – for specific crimes, including rioting, burglary or robbery, or fleeing from a police officer. Republicans argued that it would merely ensure that offenders don’t skip out on returning to court for their trials, while Democrats said that it would merely lead to more people being held simply because they can’t afford bail.

Repealing police discipline reforms – again

A constant point of friction between the D.C. Police Union and the council over the last five years has been the Comprehensive Policing and Justice Reform Amendment Act, a bill passed by local lawmakers in 2020 that imposed new police discipline reforms. The union (which represents MPD’s 3,200 officers) has fought to have the law repealed, and Congress went along – but then-president Joe Biden did not. Republicans are now trying again. 

The law requires that body camera footage from police shootings be made public within five days, limits the use of tear gas during protests, strengthens the independent Office of Police Complaints, clarifies the ban on chokeholds, and removes disciplinary matters from collective bargaining with the union.

The union argues that the law has in part caused the decrease in manpower at MPD over the last five years, but supporters say it includes common-sense provisions to ensure that police operate under the rules – and are held to account when they don’t. 

A harsher law against homelessness

Trump’s federal surge into D.C. also sought to address homelessness – or at least make it less visible. Dozens of existing homeless encampments on federal land were quickly cleared in August, leaving many residents with no place to go.

But Rep. William Timmons (R-South Carolina) says more needs to be done. His bill would increase enforcement by making camping in public – or even sleeping in one’s own car – a crime punishable by a $500 fine or 30 days in jail. 

“The District of Columbia is more than a city, it’s the front porch of our nation. Millions of visitors come here every year to see their government, monuments, and history. They expect and deserve to see a capital city that is clean, safe, and welcoming. When our public spaces are taken over by encampments, that sense of order and pride is lost,” he said. 

Homeless advocates say the bill would be harmful and ineffective; what they need is housing. (While D.C. has cleared encampments for years, it has usually done so after working with residents to identify housing options for them.) Garcia echoed that point.

“A bill that makes it a crime to be unhoused or poor is wrong and immoral,” he said. “A person who lives in a tent can’t pay a $500 fine, so instead we’re going to put them in jail?””

Make police chases great again

Police car chases are a staple of any Hollywood thriller, but on Wednesday they also became a policy matter for Democrats and Republicans to disagree on. A bill sponsored by Rep. Clay Higgins (R-Louisiana) would loosen D.C.’s existing rules on chases, restoring what he called “the power of discretion to pursue a vehicle if it’s the right thing to do.” 

In the wake of the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, the council adopted a bill limiting car chases to pursuits of accused violent offenders or to prevent someone getting killed or injured. At the time, local lawmakers pointed to the case of Karon Hylton-Brown, who was killed during a police chase over a minor traffic offense on Kennedy Street NW. Before that, in 2016, a D.C. man was killed when a carjacking suspect being chased by police slammed into his car. 

The council slightly relaxed the restrictions in 2024, giving individual officers more leeway in deciding when a car chase is appropriate and necessary.

Democrats on the committee argued that Higgins’ bill would go too far in making those chases permissible and frequent. “High-speed chases are dangerous and often cause needless deaths, injuries, and property damage, and are initiated over minor traffic violations,” said Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-Texas). 

Last month the federal government relaxed the existing policy restricting car chases by the U.S. Park Police, and the impacts were immediate – the Washington Post reported that of 10 chases initiated by those officers over traffic offenses, six resulted in crashes. 

No more traffic cameras, but many more right turns on red

Amidst what was an hours-long debate over criminal justice in D.C., Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pennsylvania) jumped in to speak for “one of the largest special interest groups in the world”: drivers.

His first proposal would ban D.C. from using traffic cameras to catch motorists in the act of speeding or running red lights. (There are almost 500 cameras across the city, which can be used for speeding, red lights, bus lane enforcement, and more.) “These cameras are a shameless money-grab that deter tourists and aggravate tourists and residents. It is unconscionable,” he said, adding that it was questionable whether or not they actually improved traffic safety.

City officials say that the traffic cameras have actually led to a decline in speeding, and decreases in traffic deaths in 2025 show that traffic enforcement measures are starting to work. But Democrats on the committee wondered why the nation’s legislature should be concerned with traffic regulation in D.C. at all.

“This is pretty ridiculous. We are now arguing about local traffic enforcement in the U.S. Congress. If we’re going to micromanage traffic and public works and the way our traffic lights work, this is not the place to do it. This is what city councils and mayors do,” said Garcia.

But that wasn’t Perry’s only extremely-local traffic concern. His second measure would prohibit D.C. from enforcing a new law that bans right turns at most red lights. “Drivers in the District want to be able to drive freely without dealing with nuanced turning laws,” he said.

At-Large Councilmember Christina Henderson had her own take on Perry, though it wasn’t particularly nuanced: “​​Been in Congress for 12 years and these bills are his battle cry?! Come on,” she tweeted.

D.C.’s judges, now more conservative?

Even though judges on D.C.’s Superior Court handle local crime, they’re nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate. It’s been a persistent problem, with lags in the process leading to judicial vacancies that slow down the legal process and overwork existing judges.

But instead of working to speed up the confirmation process, a bill from Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas) would merely eliminate the D.C. Judicial Nominations Commission, which for 50 years has recommended nominees for judgeships to the president. The commission includes members appointed by the mayor and council, so by getting rid of it, Sessions would effectively be removing any local input into who serves as a judge on D.C.’s local court. 

“As recently as last month, President Trump nominated three federal judicial nominees who were selected from the Commission’s candidate pool – a process that demonstrates the value of maintaining local input,” wrote Bowser to Congress. 

Sessions said dumping the commission would simply be more efficient, and he seemed unbothered by the possible consequences of giving the president more unfettered power to appoint judges who serve in Superior Court.

“This is a federal city. The president could more quickly make decisions about who could be serving… Will they probably be conservatives? Yes. I would not doubt that,” he said. “And at the time when the people of the U.S. make a decision to elect someone else, they would also have that equal right. It’s a good process.”