Photo by Pak Gwei

With plans to re-introduce legislation that would grant the District a voting seat in the House set for this Thursday, House Democratic Leaders, D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton and various D.C. voting rights advocates are facing increasing dissent from within over an amendment that would scrap the city’s gun laws.

Last week’s news that the legislation would be brought back and that Del. Norton was folding on her longstanding opposition to the gun amendment has provoked more angst than happiness amongst supporters of D.C. voting rights, so much that not even President Obama’s first public statement in support of the cause mustered much excitement. In fact, divisions between pragmatists who see the gun amendment as a compromise needed to move the legislation forward and others who see it as an affront to the co-equal principle of Home Rule seem to have grown more pronounced than ever before.

Both the New York Times and the Post came out against the legislation with the gun amendment, which the Post, usually a stalwart advocate for D.C. voting rights, called an “appalling choice.”

One member of the District’s Shadow Delegation, Sen. Michael Brown, also came out against the legislation, saying in an email to DCist that “it comes at too high a cost.” He added, “A half-vote is not worth our dignity, our right to self-determination or compromising our public safety.” Shadow Representative Mike Panetta offered only his conditional support for the legislation, saying that while this may be the only chance of a generation to get the District a voting seat in the House, “I’ll reserve final judgment until after I actually see the language of the ‘compromise’ on the gun amendment. We know it will be a bitter pill to swallow, the question is how big of a pill will it be?”