D.C. Council Withdrawing D.C. Crime Bill

(CNSNews.com) – D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson announced Monday that he is withdrawing the controversial D.C. crime bill after President Biden said he would not block a Republican measure doing away with key parts of the bill.

Meanwhile, the Senate is set to vote on the GOP measure anyway.

When asked to respond to the council’s decision, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said, “So as you all know, we litigated this about two days last week right here in this very room. The president expressed concerns on certain provisions of the D.C. crime bill, and as we can see the D.C. Council’s process is still ongoing, so we won’t comment on that any further.”

REPORTER: Last week you said Mayor Bowser’s opposition to the crime proposal, but she also says the override is indignity and Congress has meddled in its affairs. Why didn’t the president or the White House give her a heads up that the president wanted to sign this override legislation.

JEAN-PIERRE: She also said that she understands why the president made this decision, but – wait. Let me get into it. You just asked the question. Let me finish the first question that you asked, which is first of all, she also said that she understood why the president made this decision. Our team, the Intergovernmental Affairs team is in constant communication with her team and was last week. Don’t have anything to preview or any specific discussion that occurred, but they are in constant communication.

REPORTER: Why didn’t the White House or president give Mayor Bowser a heads up?

JEAN-PIERRE: I just told you that they’re in constant communication with the team, including last week. I’m just not going to get into specifics, but I can tell you that our Intergovernmental Affairs Office was in contact with her office last week.

REPORTER: That doesn’t exactly address the last question.

JEAN-PIERRE: I’m just telling you we were in contact –

REPORTER: How does, why if the White House cites Mayor Bowser’s opposition to the bill, why do they want to do something that she considers an indignity to her city?

JEAN-PIERRE: She also did not approve of the piece of the legislation as well.

REPORTER: The process by override she says is indignant.

JEAN-PIERRE: So let’s step back for a second. We talked about this for days last week, and still gonna tell you exactly what I said last week, which was the president – the bill was headed to the president’s desk, and the president made a decision, and we let all of you know what he was going to do and how we was going to move forward. That’s it.

He wanted to make sure that he delivered for the 700,000 residents of D.C. in a way that was, in a way that was protecting the residents here. This was brought to him. This is not something that we put forward. This is a decision that was brought to him, and he wants to be clear and communicate with the people of D.C. and with all of you on how he was going to move forward.