A law letting the District of Columbia dole out reparations took effect Thursday after clearing the monthlong review period in a Republican-controlled Congress.
The D.C. Council can now study how to compensate Black residents who are descendants of slaves or have been affected by Jim Crow-era policies.
The law, authored by Kenyan McDuffie, at-large independent, doesn’t guarantee what the payments “or other forms of redress” would look like.
The statute gives that responsibility to a 12-member commission that has yet to be established.
All D.C. laws are subject to review by federal lawmakers, who have the constitutional authority to revoke legislation before it takes effect.
Republicans exercised that power in 2023 when they led a bipartisan effort to block a rewrite to the District’s criminal code that was deemed too lenient toward criminals.
Republicans have been adamant about exerting their influence over the District’s governance since regaining the majority in Congress, such as proposals to end D.C. Home Rule and threatening to pull federal funds over Black Lives Matter murals.
The reparations law didn’t catch Republicans’ attention because it was listed under the obscurely titled Insurance Database Amendment Act.
Council Chairman Phil Mendelson, at-large Democrat, is required to appoint the commission’s voting members, including a local expert in social justice and two people from organizations with a “commitment to reparations and preventing and repairing harms caused by racial injustice,” according to the law’s text.
The commission will study the District’s history with slavery and other discriminatory policies that affected Black Americans, develop reparations proposals and set up a payment fund.
The law says government appropriations and private donations would fund reparations.
The Washington Times contacted Mr. McDuffie for comment on the law and to ask when he would like to see the commission established.
Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, returned the law unsigned in January, another indicator that the city’s top politician is mindful about taking actions that could rankle President Trump and a Republican-controlled Congress.
Earlier this week, Ms. Bowser appeared conciliatory to Republican lawmakers when she shared plans to remove a huge Black Lives Matter road mural on 16th Street Northwest, just north of the White House.
Rep. Andrew Clyde, Georgia Republican, introduced a bill seeking to pull federal funds from the city if it allowed the mural and accompanying Black Lives Matter Plaza street name to persist.
The mayor said the removal was more about the city’s shifting priorities, such as dealing with gloomy revenue forecasts because of the Trump administration’s downsizing of the federal government.
She said the city wants to repurpose the two-block stretch for the nation’s 250th anniversary celebration in 2026.
The mural, much like the reparation efforts across the country, was a reaction to the 2020 police-involved death of George Floyd, a Black man, in Minneapolis.
The local reparations movement has produced formal apologies but no direct payments to Black Americans.
California’s push for reparations has been the most substantial, with its budget allocating $12 million for “reparations bills.” State lawmakers have not approved cash payments despite a 2023 report recommending reparations of up to $1.2 million to each eligible resident.
San Francisco folded its reparation committee last year after Mayor London Breed cut funding for the group to save money.
The committee called for $5 million payouts to each eligible Black adult, eliminating personal debts and tax burdens and letting families buy homes in the city for just $1. Ms. Breed, a Democrat, argued that cash-based reparations should be handled at the federal level.
