A busy week in Washington ended on a sad note this morning with the word that former New York Congressman and Vice Presidential candidate Jack Kemp passed away last night at his Bethesda home. Kemp, who had been diagnosed with an undisclosed cancer earlier this year, was a strong advocate for District voting rights — as Mark Fisher remembers this morning, he worked closely with former Virginia Representative Tom Davis to help push forward the…

After waiting all summer, and oh, nearly 30 years since the last time a D.C. voting rights bill made it to the Senate floor, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has scheduled the cloture vote on S. 1257, the DC House Voting Rights Act of 2007, for Tuesday at 2:30 p.m. But whether the bill has the 60 votes needed to avoid a filibuster is still unclear, so voting rights activists are asking supporters to rally…

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) told reporters yesterday that he would definitely not bring the D.C. Voting Rights Act to the floor before September. This is pretty much what we’ve been expecting for the last week or so, but it’s now officially confirmed. It’s a little bit disappointing to have to continue to wait, but considering Reid also described the bill’s status as being “close” to having 60 votes, which would be enough votes…

If you work on the Hill you might still have time to run over to the Dirksen Senate Office Building, Rm. 342 for the hearing Equal Representation in Congress: Providing Voting Rights to the District of Columbia before the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The hearing, scheduled to begin at 10 a.m., will include testimony split into two panels, the first with Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.), Mayor…

After a rocky road through the U.S. House of Representatives, legislation granting the District a voting seat in the lower chamber will get its first hearing before a Senate committee tomorrow — and pretty much everyone and their mother is set to testify. In a hearing scheduled to start at 10 a.m. before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, eight witnesses will discuss the legislation that was passed in the House on…

As we mentioned yesterday, next Monday, April 16 is the long-awaited Voting Rights March. Activists, residents and supporters will take an afternoon to demand that Congress finally do something to remedy the 200-year-old disenfranchisement of the District’s residents. We’d like to see as many people out there as possible, but we recognize that it’s hard to take an entire afternoon off, regardless of how good the cause is. Fear not, though — you may only…

When legislation granting the District a voting seat in the House of Representatives came before the House Judiciary Committee last Thursday, all but two Republicans voted against it. One, Rep. Chris Cannon (R-Ut.), would see his state gain an additional seat, so his support was a given. The second, Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), was the surprise. Pence has always been a conservative’s conservative, a former leader of the Republican Study Committee (a conservative caucus within…

It seemed like it would be our year. After lobbying throughout most of 2006, voting rights activists and their allies in Congress had all but convinced House Republicans to go along with a plan to grant the District one voting seat in the House of Representatives. The relevant congressional committees had signed off on the legislation; Utah, which would similarly gain a seat in a partisan tit-for-tat exchange, formally endorsed the idea; President Bush indicated…

Are the stars aligning? We’re slow to trust Tom Davis after he toyed with our heart last week, saying first that a vote for D.C. was a sure thing, then warning us that the road was still quite long and fraught with danger. One thing’s for sure, however. Davis is doing his damnedest to build momentum (Tomentum?) for the bipartisan bill, and he’s close to convincing us it’s a real possibility. Yesterday, with District officials…

Hot off the presses, DCist has received word that the D.C. City Council will adjourn today at 12:30 p.m. to attend the introduction of the “D.C. Fairness in Representation Act of 2005,” which will take place at 1 p.m. in Room 2247 of the Rayburn House Office Building. The legislation, also known as the D.C. FAIR Act, seeks to grant the District a voting seat in the House of Representatives by increasing the size the…