Prosecutors intend to seek a new indictment and proceed with a new trial against D.C. Council member Trayon White, they announced in court Thursday — a proposal met with strong opposition from White’s defense attorneys, who said the lawmaker was being unfairly targeted in part because of his race.
In a hearing in U.S. District Court, Assistant U.S. Attorney Rebecca Ross said she expected a new trial could begin in May at the absolute earliest. Ross said the government intends to seek a superseding indictment from a grand jury, which would replace the original indictment against White and could contain different or new charges.
White, 42, faced trial for bribery last month and stands accused of accepting cash as part of a corrupt agreement to influence city contracts. But the proceeding ended in a mistrial when the jury could not agree on a verdict; nine jurors wanted to acquit White and three wanted to convict him, according to White’s attorneys. On the day the judge declared the mistrial, U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro’s office swiftly released a public statement saying it would retry the case — but Ross’s statements Thursday entered the plan into the official court record.
The announcement means the embattled lawmaker, who represents Ward 8 on the council, is in for a lengthy extension of his more than two-year legal saga. His defense attorney Gary Kohlman said the government’s decision appeared calculated “to put [White] in a situation where he will be defenseless,” given how expensive it would be for White to retain his current lawyers. Kohlman also said that if the council member was white, prosecutors would “never consider” re-trying the case after a jury split 9-3 in favor of acquittal.
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“In over 50 years of practice. I’ve never made that accusation before, never, not once,” Kohlman told reporters afterward, referring to his statements about racial bias. “Trayon White is African American. He represents, by and large, an African American community that has repeatedly elected him. He had nine people out of 12 that found him not guilty in this case, and I cannot think of any other explanation.”
Asked about Kohlman’s statements at an unrelated news conference Thursday, Pirro called the claim of racial bias “absurd.”
“We don’t care what color he is,” she said. “We care about the people of this District.”
White was arrested in August 2024 and accused of accepting $35,000 — and agreeing to accept upwards of $150,000 — in illegal bribes. The charges stemmed from meetings White had with a businessman named Allieu Kamara in the summer of 2024. Unbeknownst to White at the time, the FBI was recording their conversations because Kamara, who faced separate criminal charges of his own, agreed to act as a confidential informant to help them investigate the council member.
The videos show White accepting envelopes of cash and the two men discussing business. In the tapes, Kamara, a prolific D.C. government contractor, repeatedly asked White for help securing lucrative government grants for violence-interruption work. White agreed, and the two men discussed plans to further Kamara’s business with the city, including in other areas such as mental health services.
But White’s attorneys argued that the lawmaker never took serious steps to carry out the alleged bribery scheme and said the cash payments, which they acknowledged White accepted, could have been political donations. D.C. officials testified in court that White had discussed Kamara’s businesses with them but had never pressured them to extend the grants.
To convict White of bribery, 12 jurors would have to have agreed that White actually intended to carry out the agreement to influence the contracts. For nine, Kohlman said, the government’s evidence did not clear the bar.
Now, the prospect of a new trial and many months of additional litigation in the interim may mean White has to get new lawyers. In the FBI recordings shown at trial, White could be heard telling Kamara that he was “bankrupt”; other evidence the government agreed not to introduce to the jury showed that White also struggled with gambling debts. Kohlman said continuing with his current legal team may be prohibitively expensive.
“This is designed to break the back of Mr. White’s efforts to effectively defend himself,” Kohlman said.
Pirro said her office’s responsibility is to follow the law and pursue justice.
“We don’t throw up our hands in the air and say, ‘Oh, we’re going to go home, let it go,’” she said. “No — he took the cash. Let a jury decide.”
White declined to comment on the prospect of another indictment and trial, saying he stood by the statements of his attorney. Asked by a television reporter what the money was for, if it wasn’t a bribe, White was silent.
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