Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser (Twitter Photo)
In what may be the most high profile trip in her young administration, Washington, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser is taking a one-week trip to China with government and business leaders Nov. 7-14.
Bowser and her party will be talking to Chinese public and private sector leaders and touring the Asian superpower. The mayor said that the trip is designed to increase commercial relationships between the country and the District.
“This mission will demonstrate to our partners in China that the District is a thriving economy and a great investment,” Bowser said. “Our delegation represents the best of the nation’s capital, and we have an opportunity to both strengthen ties abroad and create more pathways to the middle class here at home. Our goal is to attract more direct foreign investment, generate jobs for D.C. residents, further diversify our local economy and bolster tourism in the nation’s capital.”
D.C. Council member Jack Evans (D-Ward 2) and Brian Kenner, the deputy mayor for planning and economic development, will join the mayor on the trip. Anthony Williams, who served as the District’s mayor from 1999-2007 and is the executive director of the Federal City Council, will also join the delegation along with such city nonprofit and business as Harry Wingo of the District of Columbia Chamber of Commerce, J.R. and Karen Meyers of The Meyers Group, Solomon Keene Jr. of the Hotel Association of Washington, D.C., Tonya Kinlow of The Children’s Medical Center, Keith Sellars of the Washington, D.C. Economic Partnership and Joshua Lopez of Olimpic Strategies.
The Bowser delegation will travel to Beijing, the capital of China, where they will meet with the mayor of the city along with U.S. Ambassador Max Baucus, a former U.S. senator from Montana, and other dignitaries. After Beijing, the delegation will travel to Shanghai and meet with that city’s mayor, and the party’s entrepreneurs and corporate leaders will have the chance to interact with Chinese investors.
China, which has the second strongest economy in the world after the United States, is a popular destination for District mayors. Vincent Gray, who served as District mayor from 2011-2015, led businesses and government leaders to China in 2012 and 2014, and his predecessor, Adrian Fenty, went there in 2008.
Williams, as mayor, traveled to the country in 2004, and the late Marion Barry set up the District-Beijing Sister Cities relationship in 1984, during his second mayoral term.
Bowser is not the only District area political leader to travel to China recently. Prince George’s County Executive Rushern Baker III led a delegation of county business, nonprofit and government leaders there from Sept. 4-12.