A couple of things:
1. The president’s signature (or a veto override) certainly is required for admission of a new state. The Constitution requires that all bills passing the House and Senate be presented to the president; the admission of new states is but one of many actions for which the Constitution requires legislation by Congress, and in each case presentment is required as well. And if you read your history, you’ll find that states have been admitted when the president signs the admission bill into law; President Benjamin Harrison famously shuffled the bills for the admission of North and South Dakota as separate states so that no one would know (including himself) which one he signed first, which is why North and South Dakota, in no particular order, are the 39th and 40th states.
Yes, SCOTUS created an exception to presentment in the particular case of constitutional amendments under the theory that, because they required approval by 2/3 of each house, presentment was unnecessary and thus inapplicable. While I recognize that such ancient precedent never will be overturned because it would call into question the approval of every prior amendment except the 13th (which Lincoln asked to be brought to him so that he could sign it), which was the same reason why SCOTUS ruled that way in the first place, I do not agree with the Court’s logic in the case. If a regular bill passed both houses by over 2/3, it still would require presentment, and if the president vetoed one still would need to go through the override process with everyone having to vote again. The same thing should occur with constitutional amendments, and had I been a Justice in the early 19th century I would have ruled that the Bill of Rights should be understood to have been adopted properly because President Washington had been made aware of their passage and did not request presentment due to a misunderstanding of the constitutional requirements by both Congress and the Executive Branch, but that, from that day onward, all bills passing both houses, including constitutional amendments, must be presented to the president.
2. As for DC statehood, it should be a total non-starter, even if the Democrats win the Senate. But instead of returning DC to MD, I would propose a State of Douglass that includes not only the current District but also its suburbs in VA and MD, which would eliminate the objection that a state should not be just one city and would finally the city to expand its tax base into the suburbs. By stripping Alexandria, Arlington County, Fairfax County, Falls Church, Fairfax, Prince William County, the two Manassas and maybe increasingly Democrat Loudon County from VA, it would turn VA into the reliably GOP state that it was until 2008 or so. And removing Montgomery, Charles and Prince George’s Counties (and Howard County as well, if we can swing that) from MD, it would make the state a lot more competitive for the GOP. We would go from 26D and 0R EVs from MD, VA and DC to 17D and 10R EVs from MD, VA and Douglass, and the Senate delegation from the region would go from 4D and 0R to 4D and 2R (with a chance at a 3D and 3R delegation if we can outperform by a bit in MD.
Damn it Pete why did I listen you? You embarrassed me in front of the sensei!!
As you know I love your idea but I can’t imagine the now rat controlled VA government ever going for it or Maryland either. What would it take? Our leaders lack imagination as it is. As we’e discussed before I’d like to see many many states reshaped to free decent people from the control of the left and ensure our control of the Presidency and Congress. Herd all the leftists into CHAZ Bantustans. I fear only violence on the part of say downstate Illinoisans or inland Californians would ever lead to freedom. At least decent folk would need to start copying BLM tactics, which seem to be effective , but most are too busy with jobs and families and hampered with respect for the law to go out and do that.
BTW what did Fredrick Douglass ever do to deserve such a shithole be named after him? ;-D Might as well name it after Rayshard Brooks.
I think retrocession is a more viable alternative if it becomes impossible to do nothing.
As for DC statehood, it SHOULD be a non-starter but is it really among rats? The types of scum who comment on “political wire” have been mentioning it for months, Pelosi is about to have a vote on it. We’ll soon see how many rats in the House vote against it (guess not many). Which rat Senators might vote no? Manchin? If you were them, wouldn’t you pull the trigger? I’d support admitting Palmyra Atoll (or DC if it was Staten Island for that matter) if I thought we could get 2 Senators out of it. As I said I’m rather surprised they haven’t been pushing for this longer and harder. They’d have to nuke the filibuster, but why wouldn’t they? Fear of escalation?
We must win this election.
The notion of a city-state is absurd, anyhow. The federal and state capital areas should not even be permitted enfranchisement for its residents for obvious reasons, as their singular reason for existence is to keep growing in size, like the metastasization of cancer.