An in-the-weeds yet consequential fight over a vacant at-large D.C. Council seat took a sudden turn Friday, ending days of confusion over who would do what and conjecture over whether whatever happened would end up in the courts.
D.C. Council Chair Phil Mendelson announced that on Monday, he will swear in Jamal Holtz, the president of the D.C. Young Democrats, to serve as an interim at-large council member for the seat vacated by Robert White, who was elected this week to be D.C.’s next delegate to Congress.
Shortly afterwards, At-Large council member Christina Henderson called off her own bid for the seat, largely ending the saga that had partly consumed the Wilson Building for the better part of the week.
Under normal circumstances, Mendelson’s announcement would have been quite unremarkable; that’s how the process is supposed to work. But circumstances this week were anything but normal, resulting in a head-scratching standoff over who was legally entitled to occupy White’s seat.
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The question was born of a quirk in D.C.’s Home Rule Charter — the city’s constitution, in effect. It mandates that of the five at-large seats on the 13-member council, only three can be held by people of the same political party. (The council chair is one of those at-large seats.) The remaining two must go members of other political parties — Republicans or Statehood Green — or independent members.
White was one of the three at-large Democrats, and upon his resignation Monday, the usual process would have given the D.C. Democratic Party the power to appoint an interim replacement until a special election could be held in the spring for someone to finish out his term.
But before local Democratic Party officials could even muster some type of process to make that appointment, Henderson said Tuesday that she was changing her party affiliation from independent to Democrat.
While the two-term lawmaker said it was a better reflection of her political philosophy, it was also an untested run around the Democratic Party. Henderson essentially claimed that third Democratic at-large seat, seemingly leaving an open seat that could only be filled by someone other than a registered Democrat.
Democratic Party officials did not take kindly to Henderson’s maneuver, saying she was violating both the spirit and the letter of the law. The Democratic Party threatened legal action, though Henderson told The Sun this week that her decision had been vetted by a number of attorneys.
Social media was replete with local politics aficionados debating the finer points of when a vacancy is an actual vacancy, whether Henderson unlawfully changed her party affiliation during a 21-day blackout period that precedes an election, and whether the Democratic Party jumped ahead of itself when on Tuesday it named Holtz as its interim appointment for White’s seat.
After Mendelson seemed to pick sides with his announcement that he would seat Holtz, there was more speculation still: Could he switch his affiliation to independent, thus allowing both Henderson and Holtz to remain as Democrats? (His spokesperson did not respond to inquiries about this theory.)
One thing was clear, though: Any final decisions would have to come before 1 p.m. Monday, when Mendelson said the swearing-in would take place. It would be unlawful for there to be four at-large Democrats, after all.
Ultimately, it was Henderson herself who waved the white flag, saying in a statement that she would re-affiliate as an independent, clearing the way for Holtz to take White’s seat. But she didn’t back away from her belief that she had been on the right side of the law, obscure and convoluted as it may be.
“Had I known that the regulations and precedence would not be followed, I would not have proceeded as I did,” she wrote, adding that pursuing the matter in the courts could have dragged out over months. “This is not the path I want to take. I had a time-limited opportunity to rejoin the Democratic Party. … But I also took an oath to serve the District and I do not believe that violating the Home Rule Act in this way is in our best interest, particularly while Republicans still control both chambers of Congress.”
In a brief conversation with The Sun, Mendelson said his decision was based on legal guidance provided by the council’s attorneys. But if any such guidance was offered, it was merely oral; his spokesperson said no written legal analysis was shared.
With the legal wrangling apparently over, Holtz’s tenure may well be short. The Democratic Party said Thursday that his appointment would be temporary — he will be an interim interim council member, in effect — until the party can organize a more open process to select an interim replacement for White. Whoever that is may not be around for long, either; D.C. voters will elect someone in a special election likely to happen in the spring.
Holtz did not respond to questions about whether he would actually be a placeholder or try to remain as an interim council member until the special election. Either way, once he’s sworn in, the Democratic Party will have no legal authority to recall him or force him to resign.
Stepping back from the convoluted controversy, Henderson’s party switcheroo revived longstanding complaints about the fact that two of the council’s at-large seats are set aside for minority parties.
Critics say the provision, written into the law 50 years by congressional Republicans concerned with Democrats controlling the city’s new elected legislature, is outdated and easily abused; local Democrats often change their party affiliation to independent specifically to run for the seats, after all. Still, changing it would be time-consuming, requiring legislation and a citywide referendum.
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