Republicans like things just the way they are, but if D.C. residents (over half of whom are black) insist on being represented in Congress like other Americans, then they prefer to tack D.C. onto Maryland.
Of course they do. Because D.C. statehood would add two new senators, who certainly would be Democrats, and very likely would be black Democrats.
“Washington, DC, is a city. It’s not a state,” GOP Sen. Susan Collins said on CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, May 2, 2021.
Combining the District of Columbia with Maryland “would make more sense,” GOP Sen. Mitt Romney said last month, alluding to “packing the Senate.”
GOP Sen. Roger Marshall said, “If the Democrats want DC statehood, make it part of Maryland.”
Rep. Glenn Grothmann said D.C. doesn’t have any mines. (He didn’t specify coal, iron, gold, or copper.)
GOP Rep. Jody Hice said D.C. doesn’t have a landfill or car dealership.
GOP Rep. Steve Salise said D.C. has crime.
Read story here, here, and here.
Apart from the fact these arguments are specious, easily rebutted, and in some cases absurd; after what they did between November 3 and January 20, I think most Democrats are in a mood to shove it down their throats.
And while they’re packing the Senate, they also should de-pack it, to avoid having to build extra pews (as it were) in the church of democracy, by combining the two Dakotas into a single state. That makes plenty of sense, because the reason they were split doesn’t exist anymore. The problem is, their 50th vote is not.
Photo: Doesn’t even have its own garbage trucks to take out the trash. You know who I mean.
