Robert White, a member of the Council of the District of Columbia, is launching a bid to challenge D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D) for her seat, amid calls for the 88-year-old delegate to retire.
“The people in the District right now are scared. We have been attacked relentlessly. Congress has stolen our money,” White said Friday during an appearance on Nexstar’s “Sunrise on The Hill.”
“Even Democrats are voting against the District right now, and the entire Congress — we have one seat. And Eleanor Holmes Norton has been a lion in that seat for decades, but right now, we need someone who can carry that torch, and she hasn’t been able to show up to the fight in the same way. That takes nothing away from everything she’s done,” he told The Hill’s Judy Kurtz and “Sunrise” host Cory Smith. “But we have to reverse course of what’s happening right now.”
White, a third-term D.C Council member and former Norton aide, launched his campaign Thursday, as local officials push back against President Trump’s federalization of law enforcement in the nation’s capital.
He said the delegate has done a lot for Washington but argued she is not able to tussle the same way she once did.
“There’s a chance that we will lose Home Rule, and we know that Congresswoman Norton, despite everything she’s done, can’t fight the way that she used to. In a moment where we need our absolute strongest fighters, we have to reverse course,” White said Friday morning, referring to the law Trump used to take control of the Metropolitan Police Department.
Norton has faced high-profile calls to retire, including from Donna Brazile, a former aide and ex-interim chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC).
“And people in D.C. are afraid. They’re looking for hope, for some glimmer of hope that we can reverse the tide. That’s what we’re going to do together,” White said Friday. “We’re going to pull that energy that you’re seeing across D.C. People are ready to push back.”
He added, “They’re ready to fight, but they need someone in that seat who can lead that fight, and I’m ready to do it.”
Former DNC official Kinney Zalesne is also challenging Norton in the primary.
White said he spoke to his former boss and hopes she will “pass the torch.”
“I would be honored to have her support, and I hope that’s something that will happen before we get to the primary,” the council member said. “We cannot afford to lose any more ground in the District, and I think she cares enough about the city to put the city first right now.”
White also previously challenged D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) but lost in the 2022 primary.