The D.C. mayor’s race is crowded. Seven Democratic candidates are dueling to succeed Muriel Bowser — a job that will mean sharing custody of the District with Donald Trump, and threading a needle between defending home rule without running afoul of the president’s popular initiatives touting safety and beautification.
The shift in management is certain to spark a flurry of new fates for the capital, spanning public parks, national monuments and the Metropolitan Police Department.
Janeese Lewis George, one of two frontrunners in the race alongside Kenyan McDuffie, said restorations like the Meridian Hill Park fountain represent “the type of investment we want to see the federal government making in our city.”
“My only issue is if this is one-time funding and not consistent funding,” Lewis George said in an interview, adding that the National Park Service, which aids beautification, has been notoriously underfunded, and many NPS employees were fired in the administration’s DOGE days. She wants to find a sustainable way to keep the projects rolling with help from the Interior Department.
Rini Sampath is a federal contractor who’s never run for public office, and the first-ever South Asian to qualify for the D.C. mayoral ballot. She’s skeptical of Trump’s efforts to make D.C. beautiful again.
“Trump is not necessarily the safest actor in all of this,” Sampath said. “He does so much of this haphazardly,” she added, pointing to other projects like the proposed 250-foot triumphal arch.
“There’s no such thing as free lunch with a relationship with the president of the United States,” Sampath said. “While you want to immediately go toward praising his accomplishments, I just don’t think it comes for free. I think there’s always some kind of a caveat.”
The fountain at Meridian Hill Park, known to locals as Malcolm X Park, shut off in 2019, just four years into Bowser’s tenure.
Vincent “VO” Orange, who’s spent nearly 15 years in D.C. politics, said “it felt like a gut punch” when the fountain was turned off. Orange, the former president of D.C.’s Chamber of Commerce and at-large council member, acknowledged the effort requires maintenance and funding to keep projects alive. But he’s “all in” for future endeavors.
Police reform has also roiled the race — particularly in light of Trump’s push to crack down on crime. There’s general consensus an MPD shakeup is coming.
Interim Chief Jeffery Carroll is likely on the way out no matter who wins the race. In a forum this month, zero of the six participating candidates raised their hand when asked if they would keep Carroll in the post.
Three of the candidates told POLITICO they’d remove Carroll, one was on the fence, and the other two said their lack of a raised hand was equivalent to declining comment.
Gary Goodweather, a business executive who’s never run for public office and is third in polling, is one of the candidates in the removal camp. Why? “Primarily, controversy,” Goodweather said. “Drama.”
Carroll is part of an ongoing lawsuit filed by several Black female MPD officers who claim he and other high-ranking officers contributed to a “toxic work environment” with continuous systemic disparate treatment and discriminatory actions toward them, according to the suit. The events occurred when Carroll was MPD assistant chief. MPD declined to comment.
The MPD put 13 officers on administrative leave earlier this month following an internal investigation into how the department records crime stats — a concern that rose all the way to Congress and U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro’s office. There are also questions about the MPD’s cooperation with federal immigration enforcement.
McDuffie, a former at-large councilmember, said in a statement he’d “appoint a chief who restores accountability and transparency.” Ernest Johnson, CEO of the Frank Reeves Center nonprofit, said he wouldn’t announce his position publicly.
But not everyone agrees. Hope Solomon, a small business owner who’s never run for public office, is the only candidate who plainly told POLITICO they wouldn’t fire Carroll, who she said faces “a difficult task.”
“It’s a balancing act with the federal law enforcement and then pressure from Congress about policing in D.C.,” Solomon said, adding she aims to boost officer recruitment and address staffing shortages that have stretched the department.
That mirrors the task that whoever wins the June 16 primary will likely face come November — with two more years of the Trump presidency to go.
“It’s a delicate dance that we are playing with the federal government,” she added.
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