Vince Morris, Candidate for DC Delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives
DC Delegate Norton Challenger Emerges from Ward Six
by Larry Janezich
Posted December 18, 2025
Ward Six resident Vince Morris says he is uniquely qualified to succeed DC’s Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holms Norton. He says he is the only candidate to have worked on key Congressional Committees – both the House Rules and the Senate Appropriations Committees. He was appointed to serve on DC Sports Entertainment Commission by Mayor Adrian Fenty and the DC Public Library Board of Trustees by Mayor Vincent Gray. More local volunteer work in the city included president of the PTA, the LSAT, and Friends of NE Library – the latter for the past 16 years.
He worked for DC Mayor Tony Williams as spokesperson and Communications Director. Over a decade of working for Congress he served as either spokesperson or communication director for members, including Senator Bernie Sanders, Representative Barbara Mikulski, and Senators Jay Rockefeller and John Kerry.
Prior to working in government, Morris was a newspaper reporter for 15 years – many of them covering Congress. Since leaving government Morris has been in public affairs and media relations.
This is his first run for political office. Asked why, Morris said that he had needed to balance his work load with his role of being a father to three kids and wanting to be present for them – that he had always been wary of time committed to activities that would pull him away from them. He says, “Now I have bandwidth because all my children are grown up – they’re all in college or out of college and I have time to really devote to something like this.”
So, why is he running? He says it’s frustration with our representation in Congress… he has respect for what Eleanor Holmes Norton accomplished early in her career, but he’s been disappointed because of missed opportunities: “We’ve allowed our relationship with other members of Congress and with the Congress generally to decline and wither and I’ve watched that happen in real time… our relationship now is worse than it’s ever been, so clearly what has been happening in the past is not working and I have ideas for how it can get better. It it would start with developing relationships and ntroducing members of Congress to the community and just educating people on what this city stands for… As the only candidate who has worked both for the District government and for Congress … I really feel like I bring to the table a close understanding of how the process works … so I know how things get done.”
Morris adds that listening to the way the other candidates talk about this campaign, “I know my approach is going to be very different. It’s going to be about building bridges – building relationships and then nurturing those relationships so that when we do have someone else in the White House and when the makeup of the Congress changes we will have more allies who will stand by the city and we can work towards statehood.”
Morris’ first hurdle will be collecting 2,000 signatures on a nominating petition to get on the primary ballot. He says, “We can’t start collecting signatures till January 26th – that’s when the petitions become available … I will be all out on 4th week in January. I’m fortunate in that because I’ve lived on Capitol Hill here in Ward 6 since 2000 and have been very active in the community through volunteer work and I easily know 2000 people right here in Ward 6 but I’m going to – of course – work around the city to get petitions signed by residents from all 8 wards.”
Looking forward to the social media battle, and asked if he has a thick skin, Morris says, “I do have a thick skin. One of the things that you gain when you work in the news businesses, you get used to editors telling you what you wrote is terrible … I have worked I worked in Congress for members of the leadership and you very quickly get adjusted to subsuming your ego for their needs…if you take things personally you don’t survive very long on the hill … I think I can handle anything that everyone says and I actually would love the opportunity to talk to people and have them ask tough questions.”
Morris says, “I look forward to that process and I think that’s really how you separate the wheat from the chaff – the other thing I’ll say on that you know, I was a Division One football player and if you’re an athlete at a very high level you get very used to not having an ego because it’s all about the team and you have to sacrifice for the greater good of your teammates and I feel like a big part of my personality was shaped by that experience. It’s also a bonding experience but the main thing is it’s a reminder that the team can’t succeed if one person is doing their own thing and so you need to work together towards a common goal. That’s been my philosophy for a lot of things in life and I would apply some of those same lessons to this challenge.”
During the interview for this article, CHC asked Morris about how he thought DC had changed under President Trump. He answered and later elaborated on the answer in a video posted to his campaign site on Facebook – see here: https://bit.ly/4j8jyzs
CAPITOL HILL CORNER 