Introduction

On August 11, 2025, Donald Trump issued Executive Order 14333, “declaring a crime emergency in the District of Columbia” (DC). In his appeal to return law and order to a fictitiously anarchic city—police data published before the activation of federal troops suggests crime is actually down year-to-date 2025 and had reached its lowest point in 30 years—Trump argued that declaring a state of exception emergency became necessary because the municipal government had failed to meet obligations to its citizens. Before DC, there was Los Angeles; since DC, Trump has summoned National Guard to stalk the streets of Memphis and Chicago, with schemes for Portland, Oregon, halted by injunction. DC and its citizens stand apart from these other stages of petty authoritarianism, as the courts have not issued injunctions against deployment in the district. In part, this fact stems from the district’s peculiar relationship to the United States government, DC being established by the Constitution as a seat of government under direct Congressional control. 

Political polarization in the United States is trending towards all-time highs. This development in the political landscape threatens hopes for progress on statehood movements and legislation presently in congressional committee. The highest-profile campaigns of the past five decades have been those of the District of Columbia (DC) and of Puerto Rico (PR), each of which seeks to become the 51st state. Support for admission can be heard from many corners of the political world. Most obviously, high-profile citizens of each territory argue for stronger integration into US politics and the US economy. But sympathetic parties, including non-profit and non-governmental organizations, come from all over the United States. In 2021, the House of Representatives passed the Washington, D.C. Admission Act, along party lines (216 to 208), sending the bill to the Senate. In the Senate, the bill died in committee. Without bipartisan support, and with a Senate structured toward inaction for partisan causes, polarization destabilizes the future for the admission of any 51st state.

This is the first in a series of blog posts examining the issue of DC and PR statehood, its history and possible consequences of success. Throughout this miniseries, we’ll study not only when, where, and why both movements developed in the twentieth century, but we’ll also contextualize the DC and PR campaigns against past, successful statehood movements and why those succeeded. We’ll examine the support for DC and PR statehood, among citizens within these territories and from the fifty admitted states. And finally, we’ll explore possible choices policymakers could decide upon.