A number of D.C. officials, including Mayor Muriel Bowser, testified before a House committee on Tuesday at the request of Republican representatives. It was the second time in recent months local officials had been called to testify before Congress – and a continuation of federal Republicans’ aggressive interference in the District’s affairs this year.

D.C. Police Chief Robert Contee, U.S. Attorney for D.C. Matthew Graves, and D.C. City Administrator Kevin Donahue were also present at the hearing, ostensibly to answer questions about spiking crime in the District and other issues related to prosecution and city governance.

Republicans on the House Committee on Oversight and Reform spent most of the hearing criticizing Graves’ office and questioning Bowser on crime and policing. Democrats, meanwhile, largely used their time to critique Republicans’ decision to call the hearing in the first place and lambast their colleagues for what they believed to be unnecessary political meddling in the city’s local affairs.

Homicides remain at a two-decade high in the city, and other crimes like carjackings and car thefts are also significantly up. House Republicans have repeatedly taken up the issue, arguing that crime in the District is an issue that personally affects them and their constituents who come and visit the city. Additionally, Congress has unique oversight power and authority over the District because it is not a state.

Federal Republicans have amped up their attempts this year to interfere with local lawmaking and cast management of the District into question. Just this year, Congress has overturned a proposed revision of D.C.’s century-old criminal code unanimously passed by the D.C. Council; initiated a separate Congressional effort to overturn D.C.’s police reform legislation; and held a previous oversight hearing with D.C. councilmembers and D.C.’s police union chair to criticize the D.C. Council’s stance on criminal justice issues.

But much of Republicans’ questioning on Tuesday was focused on the one federal government witness: U.S. Attorney for D.C. Matthew Graves, who prosecutes most of D.C.’s adult crimes and isn’t elected by local D.C. residents or chosen by local D.C. officials (one of the many consequences of D.C.’s lack of statehood). In particular, many of the Republicans focused their questioning on one statistic: The USAO declined to prosecute 67% of arrests in fiscal year 2022.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Georgia) even announced that she would take the unusual step of introducing articles of impeachment against Graves, arguing he was unfairly prosecuting people for crimes related to the violent Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol while ignoring local crimes.

“What do you think a resident in Anacostia is more afraid of – their child catching a stray bullet on Monday or a grandma walking through the Capitol more than two years ago?” Greene said at the hearing. “Your decision to not prosecute 67% of the crimes in D.C. is absolutely criminal itself.” “

Graves, the U.S. Attorney for D.C. since 2021, defended his office’s decision making. Over the past five years, the office has been prosecuting a smaller percentage of gun possession, drug possession, and misdemeanor cases – but Graves has attributed the decline in part to issues with D.C.’s crime lab, which recently lost accreditation over concerns about the accuracy of its evidence analysis and an alleged pattern of trying to cover up mistakes. Since then, it has been more expensive and complicated to process DNA, firearm, and fingerprint evidence. Additionally, Graves has said, increased access to police body camera footage means prosecutors can see earlier whether they have enough evidence to secure a conviction.

At the hearing, Graves emphasized that his office’s posture towards violent crimes has not changed in recent years, and that his office always charges serious violent crimes when they have evidence to support them.

“Every year, we charge roughly 90% of the most serious violent felonies,” Graves said. “What changed was our handling of misdemeanors – and there are complicated reasons [for that].”

He also testified that the office has been working to increase the percentage of misdemeanors it prosecutes, and the declination rate has decreased since he took the job in November of 2021.

During the nearly four-hour hearing, Republicans also questioned Bowser on a variety of topics – many focused on crime and policing, and some as far afield as a question about COVID-19 vaccine side effects and a line of questioning about curriculums in D.C. public schools.

Bowser, for her part, spent her time laying out her stance on the city’s public safety issues, emphasizing her support of D.C. statehood, and touting the city’s strong finances.

“In just over 20 years, D.C. went from junk-bond status to a triple-A rating,” Bowser told Congress in her opening remarks. And the city, she added, did this with no vote in the House or Senate, a situation she likened to having “one arm tied behind our back.”

Bowser acknowledged that D.C. has experienced some “concerning increases” in crime, including more illegal guns, and more carjackings and car thefts.

“We do not accept this as a new normal,” she said.

She also explained that D.C.’s local officials do not have exclusive control over the city’s criminal justice system: Most local crimes are prosecuted by the U.S. Attorney for D.C., which is housed under the Department of Justice. Most D.C. residents serving longer prison sentences are sent to federal prisons across the country, even for committing local crimes.

But despite this, Bowser said she took responsibility for crime issues in the city. She touted a package of public safety legislation she unveiled Monday which would detain more people ahead of their trials, limit peoples’ opportunities to have long prison sentences reduced, and introduce stiffer penalties for certain gun crimes.

“I won’t be making any excuses here. I’m a mayor, and I’m responsible for making this very complicated unique system work for my residents, businesses, and all Americans,” Bowser said.

Bowser also emphasized what she believed Congress should be doing to help D.C. and jurisdictions across the country with crime and other issues. She argued for “common sense gun legislation” to help stop the flow of illegal guns into the District (most illegal guns in the city come from states with more relaxed gun laws, chief among them Virginia). She emphasized that D.C.’s criminal justice system has been hampered by judicial vacancies, which are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate. And she said Congress could help the city by providing money to redevelop Union Station and help the Metro system with financial struggles.

Amidst the tense questioning, there were also some glimmers of common ground. Bowser agreed with Republican members who emphasized their desire to force federal workers back into their offices; Bowser has repeatedly emphasized her desire to bring workers back to downtown to help alleviate some of the devastation remote work has wrought on D.C.’s finances. And there were also some offers from Republicans to provide D.C. with more resources for prosecution and detention.

“We’re here to help,” said Rep. William Timmons (R-South Carolina). “We’re ready to provide … perhaps some financial support.”

“If it’s a resource issue, we’re willing to look at the resource issue,” added Rep. Kelly Armstrong (R-ND), who spoke after Timmons. “If you need more prosecutors to deal with first time offenders, we need to know that.”

Bowser said she would take them up on some of those offers. She told them about D.C.’s plans to replace its aging jail, and said that while the city has a plan to dedicate capital funding to that project, she “would happily work with [members of Congress] on an appropriation.”

On the question of more prosecutors, she and Graves both said they would both support funding for more staff.

“We do need more prosecutors. We do,” she said. “I’ve heard the U.S. Attorney say they’re not prosecuting a lot of misdemeanors…misdemeanors indicate, in my view, a sense of lawlessness. And that sense of lawlessness grows.”

Democrats largely focused their questioning on lambasting their Republican colleagues for holding the hearing to begin with, and giving Bowser an opportunity to explain why she believes D.C. statehood is necessary.

Rep. Maxwell Frost (D-Florida) said the committee’s Republicans were “so preoccupied with governing D.C., it makes you wonder who they really represent.”

“The fact that they pretend that they know how to govern D.C. better than y’all is patronizing,” he added.

Congressman Dan Goldman (D-New York), noted that in five months of this Congressional session, two of the committee’s nine full hearings had been spent on Washington D.C.’s local affairs.

“That is nearly a quarter of this committee’s time has been spent on a city of approximately 700,000 people … this is a waste of time,” he said.

Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio), critiqued the committee’s Republicans for focusing on D.C. instead of issues that affect all Americans.

“Instead of working towards solutions on behalf of the American people, like combating poverty, addressing gun violence, and lowering the cost of health care, Republicans are spending our precious time critiquing every local decision of the D.C. government which happens to represent a majority Black and brown city,” Brown said.

Bowser, too, said she thought it made no sense for members of Congress to attempt to overturn local D.C. laws or exert undue influence over the District, which has no voting member in the body.

At one point, Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colorado), asked Bowser, “What would you say to the law abiding citizens here in Washington D.C. who, because of policies you’ve supported, have been unable to defend themselves with this rise in crime?”

“Congresswoman, I don’t have to come here [to Congress] to talk to the residents of the District of Columbia,” Bowser replied. “I talk to them every day.”