President Joe Biden signed a measure blocking a new District of Columbia criminal code that eliminated nearly all mandatory minimum sentences, breaking with many Democrats on an issue that could sway the 2024 elections.
(Bloomberg) — President Joe Biden signed a measure blocking a new District of Columbia criminal code that eliminated nearly all mandatory minimum sentences, breaking with many Democrats on an issue that could sway the 2024 elections.
Biden signed the measure into law on Monday, the White House said.
The Senate earlier this month voted 81-14 to pass the Republican-backed resolution undoing the DC law. Most Democrats joined Republicans in voting for the measure after Biden, who originally opposed it, suddenly changed his mind and said he would sign it.
Biden’s about-face illustrated the growing political prominence of the issue of public safety, and how it has put Democrats on the defensive.
His move was meant to neutralize Republican accusations that he and his fellow Democrats are soft on crime, amid evidence that violent crime is increasing — as well as reports of carjackings and vandalism in the nation’s capital — and voters are casting ballots on those concerns.
The resolution’s passage marked the fist time in roughly three decades Congress voted to overturn a DC law. It was a blow to the District’s quest for full self-governance and statehood dealt by a president who in the past voiced support for those very goals.
Biden’s reversal reportedly angered some House Democrats because they voted against the resolution with the understanding the president would ultimately veto it. DC Mayor Muriel Bowser, like Biden, opposed the new criminal code but said that the federal intervention was a “slippery slope.”
“I will never say that we want the Congress meddling in the affairs of the District of Columbia,” she said in an NBC News interview.
Under federal law, Congress has the authority to review all laws governing the District. The DC Council passed a rewrite of the city’s criminal code last year and overrode a mayoral veto. It changed how many crimes were defined and cut mandatory minimums except for first-degree murder.
More than two dozen House Democrats voted with Republicans to overturn the code, and several Senate Democrats indicated they would follow suit. That set the stage for Biden’s reversal.
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