Following the inclusion of two riders that affect D.C. residents, Mayor Gray has released a statement voicing his displeasure on the Congressional budget deal.

Gray, as many D.C. residents have, voices anger that D.C. is not able to govern itself – and this has been reaffirmed with the budget deal Congress struck. Gray’s reaction might not be quite as fiery as Eleanor Holmes Norton’s earlier this week, but he doesn’t pull many punches, calling the deal ludicrous and hypocritical. Gray’s statement reads, in part:

I am also angry and terribly disappointed that the District of Columbia suffered collateral damage amidst partisan bickering…the District of
Columbia’s right to govern itself has, once again, been sacrificed on
the altar of political expediency…This indignity comes on top of the fact that no other state or jurisdiction had to endure the hardship of planning to shut down a municipal government, thus spending valuable resources and personnel on a process that never should have been necessary. The United States Congress ought to do what is morally right and grant the residents of the District of Columbia — who pay more than $5 billion in taxes annually — the right of full citizenship and budget autonomy.

In closing, Gray asks D.C. residents to voice their outrage by writing Congress.