Senate Derails DC's Bid for a House Seat

Residents of the nation's capital will remain without a Congressional representative after a measure that would have given them a House seat stalled in the Senate. Supporters fell three votes short on the most promising effort in 30 years, the Washington Post reports, and the bill is unlikely to come up again this session. "We have not given up," said one backer.

The measure that stalled had been a compromise between the two parties. DC, which is heavily Democratic, would have gotten one House seat and heavily Republican Utah another. Mitch McConnell says the GOP's rationale for killing the measure was simple: The Constitution says only states get congressional representatives, and DC isn't a state. Supporters, though, say it's a civil rights issue. (More Washington, DC stories.)