DCentric

Flickr: KC Ivey

Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton

I keep seeing tweets about how stripping Delegate Norton of her vote disenfranchises the 600,000 people who live in D.C…it just occurred to me that the majority of those residents are people of color. And that Congress isn’t the most diverse place, either. This move by the new Congress is unfortunate, on so many levels (via TBD):

“To me it is unseemly in the 21st century that anyone would be stripped of a vote,” said Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, who has represented Washington D.C. since 1991.

Norton said the loss of limited voting rights was a “very bitter pill” for the people of the District, who a year ago where within sight of gaining a full vote in the House. The Senate voted to give the District a fully vested representative, but attached an amendment to weaken the District’s tough gun control laws that was unacceptable to some House Democrats.

New Washington Mayor Vincent Gray said at a protest rally Tuesday that the GOP move to remove Norton’s remaining voting rights was “the most outrageous insult imaginable.”

Norton sought to prevent adoption of the new rule by offering a motion to set up a special committee to study the delegate voting issue, but it was defeated on a party-line vote.