D.C. Councilmember Robert White (D-At Large) is jumping into the race for mayor, marking the first prominent entrant into a high-profile contest.

Also on Wednesday, Ward 8 Councilmember Trayon White also announced his run via Instagram comments. Two-term incumbent Mayor Muriel Bowser has not officially said whether she will run for re-election, though she’s expected to do so.

“I do expect the mayor will run. She’ll announce at the appropriate time. She’s just busy running the city,” said Bill Lightfoot, a former councilmember and longtime advisor to the mayor.

White, who was elected to his second term on the council last year, made the formal announcement Wednesday morning, kickstarting an election season that was unusually quiet during the summer months — and is still lacking challengers for a number of seats on the D.C. Council. The Democratic primary is on June 21, 2022.

In an interview with DCist/WAMU, White, 39, diverged from usually triumphalist statements about how well D.C. has done in recent years, experiencing population growth, fiscal stability, and extensive development. He said that even before the pandemic hit, D.C. was, for some people, trending in the wrong direction.

“I’m running because people need hope,” he said. “This is a tough time in the city. Crime is going up. Our schools are not doing a good enough job for Black and brown kids. Parents with young kids are leaving the city in droves. This is really just a different time in our city, and it requires a style of leadership that I think I bring in a level of hope that we can build on.”

White was born and raised in D.C., attending Archbishop Carroll High School before enrolling at St. Mary’s College of Maryland and then American University’s Washington College of Law. After clerking for a Montgomery County court and working at a law firm, White joined the office of D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton as a legislative aide. His first run for an At-Large seat on the council ended in defeat in 2014, but he was hired by D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine — himself something a power-broker, having nurtured the political campaigns of four current lawmakers. White ran again in 2016, this time emerging victorious. He was re-elected last November.

In his time in the Wilson Building, White authored legislation to allow people serving prison sentences for felony offenses to vote, to expand the supply of affordable housing by converting rental units into low-cost homes, to help certain local businesses buy their buildings to keep from being pushed out of the city, and to study whether there is any bias in how D.C. police respond to different types of protests. The father of 5- and 2-year-old daughters, White also took an interest in measures to expand child care options and bring down the cost. On the other end, he was criticized for a 2019 vote approving a sports betting contract — a contract he had initially opposed.

Setting the stage for his own run for office, White said that while D.C. has grown consistently in population and budget over the last decade, the city’s largesse hasn’t been spread equally among its residents. A similar theme elevated former mayor Vincent Gray to office, and also framed Bowser’s two successful runs. And like him, Bowser touted herself as a native Washingtonian who grew up in a family of modest means. (Bowser and White are also Ward 4 residents; they live just over a half-mile from each other.)

“I grew up in D.C. in a family that struggled,” White said. “I’m the first college graduate in my family. So just working in D.C. politics is beyond exciting for my family. But for me, it brings a personal responsibility to make sure D.C. is working for folks like my family, the very people who we have left behind, who we have disregarded. Those are the people who need a champion.”

White declined to criticize Bowser’s tenure in office directly, saying he would “draw a contrast” should she choose to run. Critics say her administration hasn’t managed to tackle pressing issues of high housing costs and a growing gap between rich and poor, while her supporters counter that she has invested more money in affordable housing than any of her predecessors, and scaled up spending on various social services. But White did paint her as being the wrong leader for what the city needs now.

“The systems of government are showing their age and that means that we need the type of leader who’s going to dig deep into government, hold it accountable and be ambitious,” he said. “I think we are still on autopilot from a lot of what Mayor [Anthony] Williams built, and the system is showing its age. And so now we need the type of leader who’s going to get in there and fix it, make government work for people.”

White cited persistent issues with the Department of Employment Services, which manages job training programs and handles unemployment benefits, and the Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs, which does everything from license businesses to inspect residential buildings for housing code violations.

“It is difficult to get things done. You kind of have to know someone or be pretty well connected,” he said.

White said he would refocus policing and public safety on addressing the root causes of crime, which he said include poor housing and subpar educational options. He also said he would focus on spending more money to build affordable housing for the lowest-income residents. And he said he would dig into the city’s dual education system — traditional public and public charter — to push for improvements, even if that includes doing away with the mayoral control of schools that has been in place since 2008. (Earlier this year, he proposed creating a special committee to consider changes to how the education system operates.)

“Whatever it takes to fix it,” he said of possibly scrapping or chipping away at mayoral control. “The outcomes of children is so much more important than the power and authority of the mayor or anybody else.”

As White ramps up his campaign — which will be funded using the city’s public financing system — it remains to be seen who else steps into the mayoral contest. Two other Democrats have filed paperwork to run so far — James Butler and Michael Campbell — but the bigger question mark remains as to whether Bowser will run for a third term. She enjoys a formidable campaign machine and enviable approval ratings — a 2019 Washington Post poll put her approval rating at 67%, a poll conducted by the D.C. Police Union in late July of this year had it at 70% — although she has tended to lack a political base that is passionate about her. A number of her allies on the council have lost re-election bids in recent years, and an attempt to unseat At-Large Councilmember Elissa Silverman in 2018 was unsuccessful.

But should she run, White may face a political challenge in balancing the desires of an engaged progressive base that wants to oust Bowser and other voters across D.C. who may be more centrist. “You have to do something to expand the base,” says Chuck Thies, a longtime political operative who ran Gray’s unsuccessful 2014 re-election campaign. “But can you expand that while at the same time not losing it or tamping down the enthusiasm?”

Still, in his 2020 re-election campaign, White showed citywide appeal that eludes many candidates, pulling in a third of the vote in majority-Black wards 7 and 8 while also performing well in whiter wards 2 and 3.

Bowser will face her own challenges, though, especially as she faces a homicide rate that has risen in the District over the last two years. “The race will be a referendum on her tenure and what yet can be done and hasn’t been addressed,” says Tom Lindenfeld, a former campaign consultant for Bowser.

In the meantime, White is receiving Racine’s support in the race; the attorney general, long a rumored mayoral contender, bowed out on Tuesday. But he will join White for a campaign kickoff on Thursday — on Zoom, of course. One task has already been accomplished ahead of it.

“I talked to both my daughters this weekend about me running for mayor,” he said. “And that evening, my oldest daughter told someone I was running for president, so they’re starting to get it, but don’t fully comprehend.”

This story was updated with the news that Ward 8 Councilmember Trayon White is also running for mayor.