WASHINGTON (HUNS) – “You want change, vote change,” some D.C. residents heard the morning of Oct. 10. The voice of Rickey Bryant, a volunteer of the Rhonda Hamilton 4 DC campaign, echoed for hours Saturday morning as a campaign bus drove up and down the city across Wards 1, 2, 4 and 5. He, and other volunteers, frequently told voters that Hamilton reminded them of former D.C. Mayor Marion Barry.
“The lady down there told me about you and I asked what you was about. The first thing she said was that you’re just like Marion Barry,” said one voter who approached Hamilton on the corner of Georgia Avenue Northwest and Kalmia Road Northwest. “When I heard that, I jumped on board.”
A few minutes later, that voter returned and thanked Hamilton for allowing him to shake her hand. She smiled and told him to stay in touch.
“That feels so good, I love the connection,” Hamilton said.
Hamilton is an independent candidate running for Mayor of Washington, D.C. on Nov. 3 — one of three candidates on the ballot. She previously ran a write-in campaign for mayor in 2022 after being 300 signatures short from getting her name on the ballot.
Besides that previous attempt, Hamilton said the main difference between the elections is the readiness of voters. In 2022, she said, voters were hopeful for the future but with President Donald Trump in office in 2026, some of that hope has dwindled.
“I don’t think that the issues are that much different from what they were in 2022, I just think that four more years of [Trump] has exacerbated people’s emotions around it,” Hamilton said.
Her campaign, she said, is built on the idea that she is “not red or blue, just about D.C.” Previously a registered Democrat before registering as an independent in 2012, Hamilton made the switch because she felt citizens were being left behind by the two-party political system.
“The issues we’re facing are bigger than party and I believe we have something that we can do about it,” Hamilton said.
Because there is no Republican candidate on the ballot, Hamilton said she is finding more Republican voters sharing their concerns with her. On her democratic opponent, Janeese Lewis George, Hamilton said her leadership as the Ward 4 D.C. Councilmember, does not “make the case for a promotion to mayor.” Residents, she said, still report experiencing similar public safety and housing-related issues that they did when Lewis George first came into office.
From insurance to real estate to mental health advocacy, Hamilton said she has had a diverse career. She said she never imagined herself in politics and thought that at this point, celebrating her 57th birthday just days before the election, she would be retired and laying on a beach.
“I wasn’t King, I didn’t have a dream,” Hamilton joked. “…I have learned to embrace this journey and I learned that I’m not in control; God is, and I’m open to seeing where He takes me.”
Growing up, Hamilton said she was an overachiever with a stern grandmother, a military father who struggled with an opioid addiction and a mother who suffered from schizophrenia.
“It made me not feel sorry for myself but to realize that…my life was bigger than what my parents’ circumstances were,” Hamilton said.
She added that her mother’s illness led her to pay more attention to the city’s services and government involvement. It was also why she started M.I. Mother’s Keeper in 2015, a mental health advocacy organization.
Hamilton, a third-generation Washingtonian, grew up in Southeast D.C., attending Hendley Elementary School, the Friendship Educational Center (now the Patricia Roberts Harris Educational Complex) for middle school and then Dunbar High School. She also briefly attended the University of the District of Columbia from 2002 to 2004 but did not graduate after entering the real estate industry.
Juanita Briscoe grew up in Ward 8 with Hamilton and started volunteering with the campaign in 2024 after the two reconnected at a funeral.
“‘When you gonna run for mayor?’ That’s the first thing I said,” Briscoe said. “…Her vision has always been part of me.”
Over the course of the day, the campaign bus saw eight volunteers, including Briscoe, flow in and out. Across the city, they placed posters, handed out flyers and talked to voters in the neighborhoods of Shaw, Brookland and Brightwood before working their way to the Capitol Hill Porchfest and the Flea Market at Eastern Market.
Carrying a full smile, Hamilton talked to residents of all ages. With youth, she gave compliments, discussed their hobbies and even heard a request for less homework. With adults, she shared some of her top priorities, including housing, public safety and what she said more voters need to know about — D.C. home rule, which allows for the city to elect their own local government.
In the past year, conversations on home rule have grown in popularity, as Trump federalized D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) for a stint and deployed the National Guard until 2029.
“Enough is enough,” Hamilton said to a voter. “Mr. Trump don’t know my D.C. but I’d be more than happy to introduce it to him.”
Hamilton also asked the voter, “Why would [Trump] come to town and respect us when our own are running the government and leaving our people in the street?”
The solution, she said, is to either get statehood or modify the U.S. Constitution to solidify D.C.’s home rule. If elected, she said she will galvanize citizens and lobbyists to expedite the path to statehood or strengthen home rule through a new amendment.
Washington, D.C. is a popular tourist destination, with last year seeing over 27 million visitors. While canvassing, one of the first questions Hamilton often asked was if someone was a D.C. voter. If they weren’t, she would follow up with “let’s change that” or “you know someone who is.”
Most smiled and politely took a card, particularly on the corner of Georgia Avenue Northwest and Kalmia Road Northwest, which borders Silver Spring, Maryland.
During the June primary election, just over 32% of voters cast ballots. Hamilton said that needs to change because not voting is dangerous and it prevents the city from advancing. She attributes the low turnout to voters feeling “powerless” and that there is “no accountability in our government.”
For those who do live in the city, Hamilton shared that during her first days in office, she wants to audit the city “to create a continuity amongst government agencies.” She wants to start by auditing the housing agencies, especially after an auditor recently found a $52 million error in the D.C. Housing Authority budget, as reported by local media earlier this month.
Next, she wants to audit MPD. Hamilton said relationships with police are strained due to the federal government and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement impacting family structures.
“I want my tax dollar to place a young citizen in the best opportunity…not sitting in a jail cell,” Hamilton said.
Youth curfews, she said, do not work.
“Curfew, to me, means red flag because our governing body doesn’t have any solution,” Hamilton said.
She said she is not surprised by the “young people problem” because D.C. has a high cost of living, which can cause parents to work more, often leaving children alone at home.
“The energy of our youth needs to be addressed in a way that they’re not suppressed into households — losing the opportunity to expose them to alternatives,” said Hamilton, referencing alternatives such as part-time jobs, internships, sports and other extracurricular activities.
While there is much work to do, she said, she still has a strong love for the city.
“As much as I sit and call out what’s wrong [and] what I’d do different in D.C., I can’t think of another place I’d rather live other than in America and absolutely in D.C.,” Hamilton said. “And that’s what brought me forward, because I am D.C.”
In the upcoming election, Hamilton faces Democratic candidate Lewis George and D.C. Statehood Green Party candidate Robert Gross, along with several write-in candidates. Early voting in Washington, D.C. begins Oct. 26.
Myla S. Roundy is a senior reporter for HUNewsService.com covering Ward 5 and social issues. She is also the managing editor of The Hilltop at Howard University.
