Eighty Percent of Americans Back Voting Rights for District

A national survey released last week said 82 percent of Americans support congressional voting rights for the District. The survey, which polled over one thousand Americans, was conducted by a non-partisan research firm and has a margin of error of three percentage points. D.C. Vote, an advocacy group working to make congressional voting rights for the District a reality, released the survey. Ilir Zherka, executive director for D.C. Vote, said the polling results were ironic.

"The irony is that the District cannot fix this problem ourselves," Zherka said. "We need folks out of the District to support change for it to occur here." Zherka said most Americans were unaware the District does not have congressional voting rights. Polling results back Zherka's claim showing that 78 percent of Americans, nearly the same amount who support voting rights for the District---did not know D.C. residents do not have voting rights in Congress. "That is a crime in and of itself, that people don't know about this," Zherka said. "Schools don't talk about this, they don't teach children about what is going on here."

Zherka said once respondents to the poll were told of the situation, support overwhelmingly rose for Congress giving the District voting rights. With this in mind, Zherka said the key to getting voting rights for the District lies in educating more people about the problem and its affects on the District's residents. He said lack of education is the biggest obstacle organizations like his face. "There is this enormous lack of information out there. We know that the more people who know about this the more people who are for it," Zherka said. "But we don't have the money to run a $100 million campaign to educate people...our resources are limited so this remains a problem."

D.C. Vote has raised $700,000 for a national media campaign aimed at securing more support for voting rights in the District.

Though they agree congressional voting rights are needed for the District, many are not optimistic this poll will help. "Sad as it is...I have seen no indication of anything remotely happening that would ignite the type of movement necessary for real change to occur," said Daryl Harris, associate political science professor at Howard University. "The only way this poll can effect things, is if it ignites a movement to pressure those in power...I don't see a movement like that occurring any time soon."

Zherka admits more work has to be done before there is change, but says this poll is only the beginning. "This poll is just one of several tools we are using to get the information out there," Zherka said. "Victory will come in phases...we're going to work in a bipartisan interest in fixing this problem...republicans are starting to talk about this too." Polling data shows that 77 percent of respondents who identified themselves as republicans support voting rights for the District.

Zherka said D.C. Vote will work with Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton's (D-D.C.) office to have the District granted voting rights. The Hilltop attempted to contact Norton for this article but was unsuccessful, however Norton has expressed support through comments made in other publications and broadcast.

Zherka said voting rights will make Norton more effective in representing the District. residents are always getting overturned by Congress," Zherka said. He said giving Norton more power will help to curve some of the bad deals the Federal government often gives the District. "Right now the District faces a $1 billion short fall because of a prohibition on a commuter tax that Maryland and Virginia legislators had put in," Zherka said.

Currently the District has no congressional voting rights despite residents paying local and federal taxes, as well as participating in military operations like those being conducted in Iraq. In 1978, Congress passed a constitutional amendment giving the District two votes in the Senate and one in the House but the amendment failed to get ratification and expired seven years later.

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