List of Famous people born in District of Columbia, United States of America

Taraji Penda Henson is an American actress. She studied acting at Howard University and began her Hollywood career in guest roles on several television shows before making her breakthrough in Baby Boy (2001). She received praise for her performances as a prostitute in Hustle & Flow (2005), for which she received a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture nomination; and as a single mother of a disabled child in David Fincher's The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008), for which she received Academy Award, SAG Award and Critics Choice Award nominations for Best Supporting Actress. In 2010, she appeared in the action comedy Date Night, and co-starred in the remake of The Karate Kid.

Jerome Hayden "Jay" Powell is the 16th chair of the Federal Reserve, serving in that office since February 2018. He was nominated to the Board of the Federal Reserve in 2012 by President Barack Obama, and subsequently nominated to the chair of the Fed by President Donald Trump, and confirmed in each case by the United States Senate. During his chairmanship, he was both criticized and praised by Trump.

Jeffrey Wright is an American actor. He is best known for his Tony, Golden Globe, and Emmy winning role as Belize in the Broadway production Angels in America and its acclaimed HBO miniseries adaptation. He also starred as Jean-Michel Basquiat in Basquiat, Felix Leiter in the James Bond films Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace and No Time to Die, Valentin Narcisse in the HBO series Boardwalk Empire, and Beetee in The Hunger Games films. Since 2016, Wright has starred as Bernard Lowe and Arnold Weber in the HBO series Westworld. Wright will portray Commissioner James "Jim" Gordon in the superhero film The Batman (2022) by Matt Reeves.

Sucharit Bhakdi is a retired Thai-German microbiologist. In 2020 Bhakdi became a prominent exponent of ideas about the coronavirus pandemic that ran counter to the scientific consensus.

Kathleen Genevieve Ledecky is an American competitive swimmer. She has won five Olympic gold medals and 15 world championship gold medals, the most in history for a female swimmer. She is the world record holder in the women's 400-, 800-, and 1500-meter freestyle. She also holds the fastest-ever times in the women's 500-, 1000-, and 1650-yard freestyle events.

Frederick Samuel Hiatt was an American journalist and editor. He was the editorial page editor of The Washington Post. He also wrote editorials for the page, as well as a biweekly column which appeared on Mondays.

Cory Anthony Booker is an American politician, attorney, and author who has served as the junior United States Senator from New Jersey since 2013. A member of the Democratic Party, Booker is the first African-American U.S. Senator from New Jersey. He was previously the 38th Mayor of Newark from 2006 to 2013. Before that time, Booker served on the Municipal Council of Newark for the Central Ward from 1998 to 2002.

Delonte Maurice West is an American former professional basketball player who played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) for the Boston Celtics, Seattle SuperSonics, Cleveland Cavaliers, and Dallas Mavericks. He also played professionally for the Fujian Xunxing and Shanghai Sharks of the Chinese Basketball Association and the Texas Legends of the NBA G League. Prior to playing professionally, West played college basketball for Saint Joseph's University.

Susan Elizabeth Rice is an American diplomat, policy advisor, and public official serving as Director of the United States Domestic Policy Council since 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Rice served as the 27th U.S. ambassador to the United Nations from 2009 to 2013 and as the 24th U.S. national security advisor from 2013 to 2017.

Andrew Austen Luck is a former American football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for seven seasons with the Indianapolis Colts. Highly touted during his college football career at Stanford, Luck was the recipient of the Maxwell Award and Walter Camp Award in 2011 and was twice recognized as an All-American. Following his collegiate success, he was selected first overall by the Colts in the 2012 NFL Draft.