Talks proceed for vote naming House Press Gallery after Frederick Douglass

The effort to name the House Press Gallery after abolitionist Frederick Douglass is getting a push forward as Rep. Byron Donalds (R-Fla.) reintroduces a renaming resolution Friday — Frederick Douglass Day — amid favorable talks with House GOP leadership to pass it in this Congress.

The resolution would deem the third-floor offices with workspace for journalists and the gallery from which reporters can observe lawmakers on the House floor as the “Frederick Douglass Press Gallery.” Douglass, who escaped slavery in 1838 and later became a newspaper publisher, was the first Black reporter allowed in the Capitol press galleries — of which he was a member for several years in the 1870s for his newspaper the New National Era. 

Donalds’s team has been in touch with House leadership and the House Administration Committee to get this legislation set for passage, The Hill was told, and is hopeful for a markup in the House Administration Committee “within the next month or so.”

The resolution was first introduced in late 2023, and the effort to secure a vote has been on ever since. Capitol Hill reporter Pablo Manríquez reported in March 2024 that Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) had talked to Donalds about the Douglass renaming resolution.

The resolution calls Douglass "a pioneer in journalism who broke through glass ceilings throughout one of the most crucial times in American history, exhibited great perseverance to become an American hero, and became a legend known in the House Press Gallery.”

Co-leading the bill this Congress are Reps. André Carson (D-Ind.); Steven Horsford (D-Nev.), former chair of the Congressional Black Caucus; Wesley Hunt (R-Texas); and Burgess Owens (R-Utah). 

“Frederick Douglass famously said, ‘knowledge is the pathway from slavery to freedom.’ Working out of the House Press Gallery, he employed the transmission of information to empower our nation to uphold its solemn creed that all men are created equal,” Donalds said in a statement to The Hill.

“By renaming the House Press Gallery offices after him, this hallowed body will pay due respect to a man who made history in these very halls and devoted his life to bettering America through his righteous, fearless, and intrepid fight for freedom,” Donalds said.

The bill is opening up to additional co-sponsors after introduction.

Douglass was previously honored with a plaque in the House Press Gallery that was installed in 2007. The Donalds resolution says Douglass was “recorded frequently in the congressional directory and spent a significant amount of time writing and studying from the House Press Gallery.”