D.C. will make changes to the large painting of the words “Black Lives Matter” on a street one block from the White House, Mayor Muriel Bowser said a day after a member of Congress introduced legislation demanding the District remove the painting or risk losing federal funding.
“We have bigger fish to fry than fights over what has been very important to us and to their history,” Bowser said at a news conference Wednesday.
She said the current focus is making sure D.C.’s residents and economy survives.
“The threat to our city is: We came into this year with a pretty robust economy. We were concerned about vacancy in our downtown, but our trends were heading in the right direction because of our interventions,” Bowser said.
Changes to the plaza that helped DC ‘through a painful period’
The 48-foot-wide mural, on 16th Street between K and H streets NW, is directly across from the White House. Bowser ordered the painting and renamed the intersection Black Lives Matter Plaza in June 2020. It came after days of racial justice protests at the location over police brutality following the killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer.
In a statement posted on X on Tuesday, Bowser said, “The mural inspired millions of people and helped our city through a painful period, but now we can’t afford to be distracted by meaningless congressional interference.”
Bowser said that the mural will be part of D.C.’s America250 mural project, where “students and artists will create new murals across all eight wards.”
A spokesperson from the Mayor’s office told WTOP that the plaza would be “evolving into something new,” but gave no further details.
Bowser relies on her history leading District through ‘some difficult times’
The change to the plaza comes after multiple encroachments into the District’s autonomy by President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans. In the early days of his second term, Trump said he supported congressional efforts for a “federal takeover” of the nation’s capital, stating D.C. was riddled with crime, graffiti and homeless encampments.
During Trump’s second stint in the White House, Bowser has worked to avoid conflict and downplay any points of contention. She traveled to his Mar-a-Lago estate to meet with the president after his election and has publicly emphasized their points of agreement, such as a mutual desire to return federal workers back to their offices full time.
Bowser said D.C. residents know that she’s worked with Trump and they have had their issues. But, “They know that I’m going to fight for what’s important for the city,” she added.
In a post on Truth Social, President Trump notified Bowser on Wednesday that she must also “clean up all of the unsightly homeless encampments” in the District, especially around federal agency buildings.
“If she is not capable of doing so, we will be forced to do it for her! Washington, D.C. must become CLEAN and SAFE! We want to be proud of our Great Capital again. Thank you Mayor Bowser for your efforts on behalf of the Citizens of our Country. Hopefully you will be successful!” Trump added.
In response to Trump’s “federal takeover” comments, Bowser said she was eager to work with Trump on shared priorities, but he should allow elected officials to run the city.
Legislation to change Black Lives Matter Plaza to Liberty Plaza
On Monday, Republican Rep. Andrew Clyde introduced House Bill 1774, which would amend a U.S. Code to withhold “certain apportionment funds” from D.C. unless Bowser removes the Black Lives Matter phrasing from the street. The legislation also demanded the street be redesignated as “Liberty Plaza” and called for the District to remove all the Black Lives Matter Plaza references from city websites and official documents.
In a post on X, Clyde said, “It’s time for our nation to leave this failed agenda behind — starting with the removal of the BLM Plaza from America’s capital.”
“President Trump is 100% right: we must clean up Washington, D.C. for the American people,” Clyde added in a statement announcing the bill. “I believe that removing BLM Plaza must be part of this critical effort. After all, BLM is a radical, defund the police organization — but we are not a defund the police nation.”
If Clyde’s bill passes, D.C. has 60 days to comply by removing the phrase from the street and scrubbing it from all materials under the city’s jurisdiction. In 2023, the city faced similar legislation from another group of Republican lawmakers, though nothing from that proposal came to fruition.
Republican lawmakers have also proposed a bill to end the D.C. Home Rule Act of 1973, which allows the city to have control of its own local affairs, including the ability to elect a mayor, a council of representatives and Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners who manage neighborhood concerns. Congress still has the authority to review all legislation passed by the D.C. Council and the president appoints the city’s judges.
Bowser publicly sided with Black Lives Matter activists in 2020, but has said the mural is not “linked to any particular group or person — but it is an expression of I think what our city felt and continues to feel.”
Nee Nee Taylor, a founding member of the D.C. Black Lives Matter affiliate, addressed Bowser on X on Tuesday, saying, “You never cared about Black Lives Mattering. You painting those words were performative.”
The Associated Press and WTOP’s José Umaña and Abigail Constantino contributed to this report.
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