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Socialists will soon<\/span> govern three of the United States\u2019 most influential cities: Los Angeles, New York City, and the District of Columbia.<\/p>\n Janeese Lewis George joins Zohran Mamdani and Nithya Raman as part of a new wave of socialist local executives. But unlike Mamdani and Raman, Lewis George will govern a city under federal rule.<\/p>\n D.C. is a\u00a0\u201cfederal district,\u201d subject to the whims and micromanagement of the president and Congress. If the federal government doesn\u2019t like the city\u2019s legislation, it can override it. This poses additional challenges if Lewis George wants to change how things are done in the nation\u2019s capital.<\/p>\n Lewis George, a current D.C. city councilmember, has promised to usher in sweeping reforms centered around affordability, including stronger tenant protections, investments in affordable childcare, and long-sought-after reforms on the city\u2019s restrictive zoning laws. She rose to political prominence as the first socialist on the city council, winning her seat on a platform of defunding the police<\/a> in the wake of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor protests in 2020. (She has since called<\/a> for hiring additional Metropolitan Police officers.)<\/p>\n For Lewis George to fulfill her campaign promises is \u201cgoing to require Janeese to use her position and her longstanding reputation as an organizer to convince members of Congress that we can exercise Home Rule and that we deserve the dignity of any other collective body, like a state, in this country,\u201d said Kurtis Hagans, chair of Metro DC Democratic Socialists of America, which endorsed Lewis George in the primary.\u00a0<\/p>\n All local D.C. bills are required<\/a> to go through a congressional review period of 30 working days for civil legislation and 60 working days for criminal bills. If Congress doesn\u2019t like the bill, it can either decide to let that review period lapse, allowing the legislation to go into effect, or pass a joint disapproval resolution in both the House and the Senate. If they pass a disapproval resolution, it goes to the president\u2019s desk, where they can choose to veto and let the new law stand or sign it and override the legislation.\u00a0<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Speaking to The Intercept on Election Day, voters said they supported Lewis George because they wanted to elect someone who would fight for everyday Washingtonians.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI was certainly motivated by wanting really strong leadership for D.C. and people who are going to put D.C. first, in the sense of the residents and the community members and not solely as our role as the capital city,\u201d said Izetta Mobley, a voter in Ward 4, where Lewis George serves as a councilmember.<\/p>\n For Mobley and other voters, that primarily means tackling issues of affordability. \u201cAffordable housing and the rise in unhoused folks, and making sure that unhoused folks have support and city resources \u2026those were very important to me,\u201d said Mobley.\u00a0<\/p>\n Although Democrats took both houses of Congress<\/a> on Tuesday, paving a clearer path for the district to flex its autonomy, Lewis George will still have to contend with Democratic leaders like Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries, both moderates, who are likely to lead the Senate and the House next session. Schumer and Jeffries were often critical<\/a> of Mamdani when he was running for mayor<\/a> in their home state of New York, though they seized primarily on his stance on Israel<\/a>.<\/p>\n Hagans pointed out that Lewis George has the longtime support of former at-large councilmember Robert White, who was elected as Washington\u2019s non-voting delegate on Tuesday. But Hagans said the DC Metro DSA is also preparing to organize residents to put pressure on Congress, given \u201dthe relative powerlessness of the district in the face of Congress.\u201d<\/p>\n Governing Washington has other pitfalls. The district is hamstrung<\/a> by the fact that the D.C. Council is required to pass a balanced budget and is prohibited from carrying it over into the following year. (Congress also gets to approve<\/a> it.) The city is already struggling to close a $1.1 billion budget deficit<\/a> for the upcoming fiscal year \u2014 caused by Congress.\u00a0<\/p>\n In order to achieve her agenda, Lewis George has suggested raising taxes<\/a> on businesses and the city\u2019s wealthiest residents<\/a>. For that, she\u2019ll need the support of the city council.\u00a0<\/p>\n Lewis George is aided by the fact that Tuesday also ushered in a record number of socialists on the city council, adding two, Aparna Raj and Oye Owolewa. \u201cA big part of the vision for the district is to have these organizers on the council as well as an organizer-in-chief at the executive level,\u201d said Hagans.<\/p>\n