Muriel Bowser for Mayor

I have endorsed Mayor Muriel Bowser for a third term in a lengthy column in another paper and that endorsement can be read here. It highlights the work she has done, and is doing, to make real her vision for the District of Columbia. That vision is: To guarantee every person in the District a fair shot at a decent home, a good education, a good job, all leading to a fair and equal shot at success, while living in a safe community.

Muriel Bowser has kept her promises including expanding affordable housing and reducing homelessness. She stood up to Donald Trump, is working closely with the Biden administration, brought us through the Covid pandemic, closed DC General, recently put a shovel in the ground for the new Ward 8 hospital, finished the successful 1st phase of the Wharf, and stood with Ward 7 residents announcing the new full-service supermarket and housing at Skyland. Our schools have improved and she has added bike lanes and streeteries; doing all this while ensuring a balanced budget and high bond ratings for the last 7 years. One of the major issues in DC today is the increased violence. Muriel Bowser has fought to fully fund the MPD and improve their training, while at the same time funding a host of community efforts trying to curb the violence. We know this violence is not only a DC issue and she is working with surrounding county and state leaders trying to do something about it. It is a national issue. 

Muriel Bowser has become a respected national figure and done more to advocate for Statehood than any Mayor before her. There is no logical reason not to vote to keep her in office. Muriel Bowser is an incredibly strong, smart, savvy woman who proves what many of us already know; women make better leaders. 

In my original endorsement column, I never mentioned her opponents.  But a recent column in the Washington Post, “Candidate Robert White pitches guaranteed job for every D.C. resident,” caught my attention. I read the column and thought to myself this is a desperate candidate willing to say anything to get a headline. On the day the column came out I looked on White’s website to see if he had any more details and found none. The Post reported White would give every District resident a job without specifying any details other than to say the city would add 10,000 employees at a cost of about $1.5 billion annually. No real details on which jobs, what training programs, or what current programs he would take the money from. Would he again, as he has in the past, propose taking money from the MPD which he did when ‘defund the police’ was the slogan of the day? Would he propose cutting funds from the affordable housing program? He used Marion Barry’s name comparing his proposal to Barry’s summer youth program; there is no comparison. 

White also suggested his programs would help reduce crime. He conveniently forgets what no DC resident will, it was during Marion Barry’s time as Mayor, even while he was doing some really good things, the city was called the ‘murder capital’. In 1989 there were over 400 murders in the city. 

Robert White is a decent guy but without much success for his time on the Council. But if he wants to be taken seriously in the future, he needs to do more than throw out a proposal like this to garner a quick headline. Considering his time on the Council he should know the people of the District are much too smart to fall for a headline. Along with this proposal and its lack of detail, his call for reinstatement of the school board, and his unsuccessful effort to have fellow Councilmember Trayon White thrown off the ballot; he just looks desperate. With less than two months before the primary, it’s not a good look.