Council Chairman Phil Mendelson announced the withdrawal of the law, which would have overhauled how the nation’s capital prosecutes and punishes crime. It was a rare move that he said wasn’t prohibited under Washington’s Home Rule authority.
“This desperate, made-up maneuver not only has no basis in the DC Home Rule Act, but underscores the completely unserious way the DC Council has legislated," Hagerty said in a statement."No matter how hard they try, the Council cannot avoid accountability for passing this disastrous, dangerous DC soft-on-crime bill that will make residents and visitors less safe.”
Congress reviews all newly passed D.C. laws under the Home Rule arrangement, and frequently alters or limits them through budget riders. But the criminal code rewrite seems set to be the first law since 1991 to be completely overturned. The measure to reject the law passed the House and faces a Senate vote this week.
The debate has been complicated by the fact that Washington’s own Democratic mayor, Muriel Bowser, opposes the new criminal code. BowserIn vetoing the revised criminal code, Bowser said she opposed provisions such as a reduction in the maximum penalties for burglary, carjacking, robbery and other offenses.
Mendelson said Monday that the criminal code had been hijacked by Republicans in Congress, eager to create a hot-button issue that would carry through the 2024 presidential elections. Mendelson said the reduced maximum penalties for different crimes still set the maximum far above the sentences chosen by the vast majority of judges around the country. He accused congressional Republicans of willfully spreading misinformation on the subject — singling out House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., who told CNBC Monday morning that the new D.C. code “decriminalized everything,” including carjacking.
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