Trump efforts on DC death penalty – an affront to home rule, will impact Black and brown people disproportionately

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
August 27, 2025

PRESS CONTACT:
Ilir Zherka 
202-262-4687 
[email protected]  

Washington, DC. Today, DC Vote. Below is a statement from Jack Jacobson, Board Chair of DC Vote. It may be quoted in whole or in part.

We’re not going to mince words: Donald Trump is threatening to reimpose the death penalty in Washington, D.C.

Let’s be clear, this is not about reducing crime. It is about control — and it will fall hardest on Black and Brown Washingtonians. We have no state prison system, meaning residents are often sent far from their families and loved ones. And because we lack statehood, Trump can exploit federal authority to impose executions in a city that abolished capital punishment over forty years ago — and where voters have consistently rejected it ever since.

Without statehood, D.C. residents remain vulnerable to policies we do not want, imposed by leaders we did not elect.