President Donald Trump speaks to the media as he arrives at Glasgow Prestwick Airport on July 25, 2025, in Prestwick, Scotland. (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)
The bill, which Lee introduced alongside Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., has not made it out of committee since being dropped in February. But Trump’s highlight of an attack against former DOGE staffer Edward Coristine, also known as "Big Balls," has resurrected the discussion.
"The Constitution already federalizes D.C.," Lee said on X. "We just need Congress to do its job — and reassert its lawmaking power over our nation’s capital city. My bill, the BOWSER Act, would do that."
Fox News Digital reached out to Lee for further comment.
DC Mayor Muriel Bowser speaks at a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on March 10, 2025. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis)
Zack Smith, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation and a former prosecutor, told Fox News Digital that in the past, the D.C. council has pushed "policies that have made it much more difficult for law enforcement, for prosecutors, to do their jobs and keep citizens safe."
Bowser and the D.C. Council have, for several years, worked to update the District’s criminal code. However, changes to the code that would have severely lowered sentencing for a variety of crimes that were at first vetoed by Bowser were on the precipice of becoming law before Congress and former President Joe Biden overrode the reforms.
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Smith noted that Congress still has the authority to legislate the District, meaning that lawmakers and the federal government are "still the backstop," and that both Trump and Lee were right to call for a "reevaluation of the District’s status."
"That's why Congress was able to step in and overturn that proposed radical rewrite of the Criminal Code," he said. "And so what the BOWSER Act would actually do, if it repeals home rule, it would essentially change the way the local D.C. government functions. It might involve Congress and the Federal Government taking a more direct role."
"I think there is broad and in some ways bipartisan consensus that the current system in D.C. is not working as it should," he continued.
Alex Miller is a writer for Fox News Digital covering the U.S. Senate.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/violent-attack-reignites-bowser-act-debate-trump-floats-federal-takeover-dc