D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser’s most persistent critic these days is neither of her two top challengers in the June Democratic primary.
Instead, as Bowser seeks reelection to a third term, she finds herself wrangling with outgoing D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine, whose disregard for the mayor — percolating since both took office seven years ago — threatens to overshadow the challenger he has endorsed to beat her, council member Robert White (D-At large).
Wp Get the full experience.Choose your plan ArrowRight
The hostility between Bowser (D) and Racine was evident at a news conference she hosted recently to launch an anti-crime initiative. The mayor was surrounded by a phalanx of law enforcement leaders, including D.C. Police Chief Robert J. Contee III and U.S. Attorney Matthew Graves.
Story continues below advertisement
Racine, the city’s top prosecutor, was absent.
“I’ll have to check on that,” Bowser said when a reporter asked if the attorney general had been invited. The mayor cut off another reporter who began to ask about her often-contentious relationship with Racine. “I’m not going to do any politics questions,” she said. “We know that the attorney general is doing a lot of politics.”
Advertisement
Asked later about the mayor not inviting him to the announcement, Racine said, “They certainly know my email address, my cellphone.”
“Pointing out failures that hurt District residents isn’t about politics,” he added. “It’s what leaders do.”
For months, even after he announced he would not seek reelection or challenge Bowser, Racine has seized on opportunities to criticize the mayor and the performance of her administration, fueling questions about whether he plans to enter the race as a third-party or independent candidate if Bowser wins the primary.
Story continues below advertisement
Whatever he does, the attorney general’s attacks on Bowser have focused on areas that a recent Washington Post poll found the mayor is vulnerable on — issues such as public safety and affordable housing. He also has repeatedly brought up a scandal at the D.C. Housing Authority that led to the resignation of a Bowser appointee.
Washington Post poll: D.C. Mayor Bowser’s approval rating drops amid rising concerns about crime
Racine, who has contemplated challenging Bowser over the years, likes to remind associates that his citywide vote total surpassed hers when both ran for reelection against nominal opposition in 2018. He also has backed council candidates in previous elections who defeated opponents whom Bowser supported.
Advertisement
But Racine, 59, has indicated that when his term ends this year, he plans to return to the private sector, where he is sure to command a far greater salary than the $210,000 he has earned annually as attorney general.
Story continues below advertisement
“I’m looking forward to making money after I leave the Office of Attorney General again,” he told the council recently.
Yet Racine’s criticism of Bowser feeds speculation that he retains mayoral ambitions and could enter the campaign in the general election — a possibility raised recently by former mayor Anthony Williams (D).
“People say you’re waiting strategically to make your move in the mayor’s race,” Williams, now executive director of the nonprofit Federal City Council, said when Racine addressed the panel during a private session in February.
“I said I’m not running again,” Racine replied, before adding that he reconsiders his decision “every now and again,” when he becomes upset about “unfair accusations that go to the heart of the problems” in the city.
“I actually start saying, ‘You know what? That is B.S. and I can go do something about it,’ ” he said, according to a video of his appearance obtained by The Post.
Using his platform
No matter his aim, Racine is using his platform as a citywide leader and as White’s highest-profile supporter to denigrate Bowser’s record and question the competence and ethics of her administration.
Advertisement
Story continues below advertisement
During his Federal City Council appearance, as well as at a fundraiser where he introduced White, Racine invoked Neil Albert, a Bowser appointee and the former chair of the board overseeing public housing who resigned after it was disclosed that he had authorized contracts for a design firm owned by his companion, Paola Moya.
Federal prosecutors have issued a subpoena for Housing Authority records pertaining to Albert and Moya. Albert has not been charged with any crime. Bowser referred the matter to the city’s ethics board.
As Bowser launches reelection bid, her high-profile appointee is under fire
Racine also has derided the mayor for what he has described as her attempt to duck blame for a surge in violent crime. His criticism came after the mayor, in a newsletter her office sent out in late January, urged the public to hold the attorney general, among others, accountable for the city’s rising crime rate.
Advertisement
Story continues below advertisement
Regarding the rancor between Bowser and him, Racine said he wishes “there was better coordination at the highest levels. I think it’s lamentable that there isn’t.” But he added: “I think it’s also, honestly, not an indication of great leadership when people point fingers and scapegoat.”
Bowser did not agree to be interviewed for this article. But in a statement, her spokeswoman, LaToya Foster, said the mayor supported the creation of an independent attorney general’s office and “even encouraged” Racine to run in 2014.
“But philosophical differences have surfaced about how to keep the District safe from repeat violent offenders,” Foster said. “Despite his intensely political and increasingly erratic behavior, we will not be distracted from doing all that we can to strengthen every part of the public safety ecosystem.”
Advertisement
Story continues below advertisement
A Bowser associate who has spoken to the mayor about Racine said she has long regarded him as a potential political threat. Her team has watched as he has drawn national attention filing lawsuits against the likes of President Donald Trump and the Proud Boys. They also know that four council candidates whom Racine has supported have defeated those backed by Bowser.
In 2018, when both Bowser and Racine were seeking reelection against nominal opposition, Racine surpassed the mayor in citywide vote totals, 207,000 to 171,000.
“She views him as a competitor who has been critical of her — it’s as simple as that,” said the associate, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the topic. “She doesn’t want to share the limelight with anyone, especially not him.”
While the sparring between the mayor and Racine has been fodder for chatter in political circles, the two Democrats challenging Bowser in the primary — White, Racine’s preferred candidate, and council member Trayon White Sr. (D-Ward 8) — are struggling to gain attention with four months to go.
The Post poll found that 61 percent of those surveyed did not know enough about Robert White to have an opinion of him; 47 percent said the same about Trayon White. Both are trailing Bowser by nearly 30 points in the poll. Bowser’s approval rating among Washingtonians, while slipping, is at 58 percent, the poll found.
Advertisement
Story continues below advertisement
At one time, Racine was a Bowser donor, giving her a total of $1,500 in three separate campaign contributions when she ran for the council. In 2014, when she campaigned for mayor, Racine gave Bowser $2,000, records show.
That same year, according to the records, Bill Lightfoot, the mayor’s campaign chair, and Beverly Perry, another close Bowser ally, contributed to Racine’s race to become the city’s first elected attorney general.
“It’s very fair to say that Mayor Bowser and the ‘green team’ supported Karl,” said Lightfoot, referring to the network of supporters Bowser inherited from her mentor, former mayor Adrian Fenty (D).
Racine, when asked about the significance of his contributions, said he gave money as part of his role as managing partner at Venable, where colleagues donated to local and national politicians.
Advertisement
Story continues below advertisement
“I wouldn’t read too much into it,” he said.
Goodwill gone
Whatever goodwill existed between Bowser and Racine vanished soon after they took office, when the mayor unsuccessfully sought to weaken the authority of the attorney general’s office by proposing that lawyers on her staff retain oversight of local laws, land deals and other legal business.
Incensed, Racine accused Bowser of ignoring the electorate, 76 percent of which had voted to create an independent attorney general’s seat. “I fully expected growing pains and even tension,” Racine said, recalling when he took office. “I was surprised, shocked and massively disappointed when the mayor sought to overturn the will of the people.”
“Not withstanding that fray, that hiccup, that incident, we have fully performed,” he added.
Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) said the strain between Bowser and Racine has remained since then but has become more palpable recently. “The relationship between the two has never been as good as it should be,” he said.
Advertisement
At times, Mendelson said, the strain can seem petty, such as when, before the pandemic, Racine was not invited to monthly breakfast meetings hosted by the Bowser administration and the council. “The attorney general would say, ‘Hey, can I join you guys?’ ” the chairman said. “I was the one who had to extend the invitation. It was an unnecessary slight.”
The differences between Bowser and Racine were apparent again in 2016, when the mayor backed Vincent B. Orange in his campaign to become an at-large councilman — a race he lost to Robert White, whom Racine supported.
Democratic challengers seek traction in race to unseat D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser
Two years later, Bowser enlisted her political and donor network to support Dionne Bussey-Reeder’s losing campaign against council member Elissa Silverman (I-At large), whom Racine endorsed.
In 2020, in Ward 4, the mayor’s home political base, Racine endorsed Janeese Lewis George, an attorney from his office who trounced Bowser’s close political ally, incumbent council member Brandon T. Todd.
That same year, Racine backed Brooke Pinto, another attorney from his office, in her council campaign in Ward 2. Pinto’s victory gave Racine ties to five of the council’s 13 members, a clique that also includes Trayon White, among four lawmakers who formerly worked for the attorney general’s office.
Bowser’s team took notice.
“Her sense is that he has intruded on her territory by endorsing candidates for this or that office,” said Terry Lynch, a longtime Bowser supporter who is executive director of the Downtown Cluster of Congregations. “The mayor’s position, historically, is much more political than the AG’s job. Any mayor is going to bristle when they see the A.G. get into politics. She’s going to defend her turf.”
Their differences aren’t always over politics or policy. Racine also has chided Bowser over the performance of her agencies, including the city’s crime lab, an agency rife with problems that lost its accreditation last year.
During his Federal City Council appearance, Racine said his office had stopped representing the agency on matters relating to the quality and integrity of forensic testing “because they constantly lied to us about the state of their incompetence.”
He also has attacked the Department of Corrections, writing in a Post opinion article last fall that “squalid conditions” at the D.C. jail are the result of “a lack of will and leadership” and that the “the mayor needs to step up.”
Racine then announced that his agency would not represent the department in a legal matters pertaining to the jail conditions, an assertion that prompted Bowser to counter: “The attorney general has veered into being a political figure only, and that’s unfortunate since he’s my lawyer, too.”
Racine, who has worked as a public defender and served as an associate counsel in the Clinton White House, regards it as part of his mission to serve as a de facto government watchdog, a role that includes backing candidates whose agendas he supports. In the case of Robert White, a former employee of the attorney general’s office, Racine said he plans to “advocate like crazy and I will be around, knocking on doors and going around the city to give residents my view of what the city needs.”
Broader fractures
George Derek Musgrove, a historian at the University of Maryland Baltimore County who has written about D.C., said the Bowser-Racine divide, in some ways, reflects broader fractures in the Democratic Party, with the mayor backing moderate, business-friendly Democrats and the attorney general promoting left-leaning candidates.
“To a certain degree, these personal barbs are part of a larger discussion that no one wants to dig into about the direction of the city,” said Musgrove, who has donated to Robert White’s campaign. “You can see it in policing, with Racine wanting to pull back on tough-on-crime policing and Bowser going in the opposite direction. You can make the same case with developers — Racine has carved out the position of cracking down on slumlords and backing renters. Bowser has always been aligned with developers.”
Charles Wilson, chair of the D.C. Democratic Party, said that while the bickering between Bowser and Racine draws attention from political insiders, ultimately it is of minimal public interest.
“I’ve never talked to a voter who said, ‘Wow, the mayor and the attorney general don’t get along,’ ” he said. “They’re more concerned with how all our elected officials are working together to solve the problems of the District.”