Biden says he strongly supports making DC the 51st state because it will 'make our union stronger' - while Republicans say it shouldn't even be a congressional district

 President Joe Biden's administration on Tuesday backed making Washington D.C. the 51st state as the House prepares to vote this week on legislation that would make it so. 

'For far too long, the more than 700,000 people of Washington, D.C. have been deprived of full representation in the U.S. Congress,' the administration said in a statement of policy release by the Office of Management and Budget. 'This taxation without representation and denial of self-governance is an affront to the democratic values on which our Nation was founded.'

Biden's administration called the move 'long overdue' and said would make a more stronger union.

'Establishing the State of Washington, Douglass Commonwealth as the 51st state will make our Union stronger and more just,' the administration said. 

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President Biden's administration backed making Washington D.C. the 51st state

The House will vote this week - likely on Thursday - on legislation to make DC the 51st state after Democrats prioritized the issue. The bill, H.R. 51, passed out of committee last week in a party-line vote. 

Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, the Democrat who represents D.C. in the House but has no voting power in the chamber since it's not a state, thanked the Biden administration for its support.

'Thank you to the Biden administration,' Norton said. 'The residents of our nation's capital deserve voting representation in Congress and full local self-government, and with Thursday's House vote and expected passage, along with Democratic control of the Senate and White House, we have never been closer to statehood.'

Republicans - like Congresswomen Nancy Mace of South Carolina and Liz Cheney of Wyoming - oppose DC statehood as the highly Democratic area would give Dems another House seat

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Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, the Democrat who represents D.C. in the House but has no voting power in the chamber since it's not a state, thanked the Biden administration for its support

Even with Democratic control of Congress, H.R. 51 faces an uphill battle in the Senate. Democrats would need 10 Republicans to cross over and support the legislation in order to have the 60 vote margin needed to advance legislation to a final vote.

Republicans voiced opposition to the bill. If DC became a state, the highly-Democratic area would give Nancy Pelosi and her Democrats another seat in the House along with two Democratic senators. 

Republican Congresswoman Nancy Mace of South Carolina argued 'DC wouldn't even qualify as a singular congressional district and here they are - what they want is the power and the authority of it being an entire state in the United States, and they want that power.'