The mistrial in D.C. Council member Trayon White Sr.’s federal bribery case resolves — at least for the moment — whether the lawmaker has to surrender his seat as a conviction would have required.
The question that remains unanswered is how his D.C. Council colleagues will respond to U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras’s Monday ruling, which allows White (D-Ward 8) to continue representing his constituents in Southeast Washington.
The council has the authority to expel White, as it did last year following his 2024 arrest. The lawmakers can also choose not to act — as they did when White reclaimed his seat after winning a special election last year — and await the outcome of U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s pledge to retry him.
The lawmaker who will play a central role in that decision is Council Chair Phil Mendelson (D), who was a leader in the effort to expel White last year and stripped him of his committee chairmanship following his arrest.
Mendelson, in a brief telephone interview, said he expected that the council would allow the legal process to unfold without taking any action.
“I don’t think the council will move at this time with expulsion,” he said. Asked for a reason, he said, “That’s the best you’re going to get out of me.”
The stakes are high for a legislative body that has been tarnished by scandal over the years. In White’s case, a 2024 council investigation found “substantial evidence” that the lawmaker violated the body’s ethics rules by using his office for personal financial gain.
If they take no action against White, the lawmakers risk catalyzing criticism that they tolerate misconduct, a perception that could invite further scrutiny from President Donald Trump and House Republicans, who have embraced opportunities to criticize the city.
“The fact that the court had a mistrial does not absolve the councilman of possible guilt,” said Craig Holman, a government affairs lobbyist for the nonprofit group Public Citizen, who has advocated for the council to adopt a more stringent ethics code. “I would still encourage the council to at least admonish the councilman so it doesn’t look like they’re giving a nod of approval.”
At the same time, the council risks reviving complaints that it is ignoring the will of voters of Ward 8 who elected White after his 2024 arrest, then returned him to office last year after his expulsion, a race he won narrowly with 27 percent of the vote.
“It depends on whether the council has an appetite to go through this again,” said Mary M. Cheh, a former D.C. Council member. “They can do it. They have the right to do it. But whether they have the appetite is a separate question.”
What a majority of the lawmakers are thinking remained unknown in the hours after the judge’s ruling.
Council members Brianne K. Nadeau (D-Ward 1) and Robert C. White Jr. (D-At large) declined to comment through their spokesmen. Council member Janeese Lewis George (D-Ward 4), the Democratic nominee to succeed Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D), also declined to comment.
Six other lawmakers — Brooke Pinto (D-Ward 2), Zachary Parker (D-Ward 5), Wendell Felder (D-Ward 7) Anita Bonds (D-At large), Christina Henderson (I-At large), and Matthew Frumin (D-Ward 3) — did not respond to messages.
Council member Charles Allen (D-Ward 6), who voted to expel White last year, said in a statement that White’s “actions and continued disregard of ethics in public office embarrass the institution of the Council.”
“Nothing about today’s outcome changes that fact,” he said.
Council member Elissa Silverman (I-At large), in a text exchange with a reporter, did not directly answer whether she would support or oppose an effort to expel White. In a written statement, she said the council needed to “respect the legal process and today’s unsettled outcome” and that she would work with White to ensure that Ward 8 residents “get the attention they deserve.”
“The legal standard of proof needed in court is not the threshold in the court of public opinion, however,” Silverman wrote. “We have to recognize the impact this case has had on the reputation of our government and the public’s trust in our actions. As a council, we need to redouble our efforts to act solely in the public and our city’s best interest.”
White, 42, who was elected to the council in 2016, maintained his innocence after the mistrial ruling and expressed eagerness to focus on representing the 87,000 constituents he represents in the city’s poorest ward.
He also made a point of mocking Pirro after news surfaced on social media that her office would retry the council member. “Trump didn’t fire her yet?” White wrote in a reply to a post on Instagram. “Guess she is not tired of losing.”
Prosecutors presented as evidence videotaped recordings of White accepting envelopes stuffed with $35,000 in cash from a businessman. In exchange, prosecutors contend that White promised to help extend the businessman’s government contracts providing anti-violence workers in crime-riddled neighborhoods.
Prosecutors allege that White and Allieu Kamara, the contractor who was serving as an FBI informant, had an agreement that would have netted the council member a total of $156,000.
In a pre-trial agreement, White acknowledged taking the money from Kamara in exchange for prosecutors not raising his past gambling debts as evidence.
Asked outside court Monday if he expected Mendelson to return his committee assignments, White said, “I can’t think for the chairman, but I think that the people of Ward 8 deserve to have equity and inclusion in a government of $20 billion.”
Ron Lester, a veteran D.C. pollster whose past clients have included D.C. mayors Marion Barry and Vincent C. Gray, said a risk Mendelson could face in seeking to expel White a second time is the possibility that a jury will acquit him at a retrial.
“How’s that going to look for Phil?” Lester asked. “The wisest course is to let the justice process play out. This matter will ultimately be decided by a jury. Anything else would be prejudicial.”
The danger for the council, said Cheh, who retired from the council in 2023 after four terms, is that the body can appear to be “piling on” if another trial results in an outcome that benefits White.
At the same time, she said that Ward 8 residents “deserve a representative who is not mired in this kind of controversy and criminal allegations.”
“There’s collateral benefit to removing him,” Cheh said. White’s constituents, she said, ”need someone who can devote himself to the interests of Ward 8. I don’t think that has been happening.”
Chuck Thies, a longtime D.C. political consultant, said the risk of council inaction, irrespective of another trial’s outcome, is the legislative body’s reputation.
“Not enough people are asking, ‘What is the political risk of doing nothing and allowing the institution to be sullied?’” Thies said. “Precedence is the risk — that future councils will say, cowardice prevails. We put the politics of the individual council member over the institution.”
Philip Pannell, a Democratic organizer in Southeast Washington, said expelling White would only “anger a lot of people in Ward 8. It would just heat up the atmosphere, and I don’t know that that would help in this situation.”
“It’s a hornet’s nest,” Pannell said. “It’s a sad situation for everyone involved. Unfortunately, it’s not going away anytime soon.”
The post After mistrial, Trayon White Sr.’s D.C. Council colleagues weigh their options appeared first on Washington Post.
