Former D.C. mayor Vincent C. Gray is greeted by supporters before he kicks off his campaign for Ward 7 D.C. Council at The House of Praise in Washington, D.C.. (Astrid Riecken/For The Washington Post)

Former D.C. mayor Vincent C. Gray on Saturday officially launched his comeback campaign to rejoin the D.C. Council, telling an audience east of the Anacostia River that with a federal investigation behind him, he was running to right “injustice” in the nation’s capital.

Gray said residents in Ward 7 are being unjustly denied safe neighborhoods, improving schools and health-care options available to others across more prosperous, western stretches of the city and that he would fight to bring a fairer share of those resources to his home ward.

But Gray also left little doubt that the campaign would be a platform for him to make a personal pitch for political redemption and to denounce a ­now-fizzled federal investigation into the campaign spending of his first mayoral campaign. That investigation dragged out for five years, and weeks before he sought the nomination for a second term, a federal prosecutor alleged Gray had direct knowledge of illegal fundraising on his behalf. The allegation was widely seen as costing Gray the 2014 election, but prosecutors last year dropped the case, saying they did not have enough evidence for a conviction.

“Campaigns are typically about the future, and while I want to focus on that a tad, I do just also want to take a moment to talk about the past, and that is injustice . . . what I think was an incredibly unfair, difficult time in my life,” Gray said in his campaign kickoff before about 100 people at the House of Praise church in Northeast Washington.

Gray’s candidacy in Ward 7, where he dominated in two mayoral elections and in council contests before that, promises a competitive race for the Democratic primary in June with incumbent Ward 7 council member Yvette M. Alexander (D).

Gray waves at supporters Saturday before his campaign kickoff. (Astrid Riecken/For The Washington Post)

His bid, however, could also have broader political consequences, as Gray made clear Saturday that part of his strategy would be to question the policies and performance of Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D), who succeeded him.

Gray zeroed in on the District’s dramatic rise in homicides during Bowser’s first year in office.

Crime “was at the lowest level it was in many years until, of course, last year,” he said, going on to list homicide tallies in each of his four years in office compared with the more than 50 percent increase Bowser grappled with last year. “We need safer neighborhoods,” he said.

Gray also gave a full-throated defense of increasing funding for charter schools, for the city funding construction of a new hospital east of the Anacostia River and other initiatives that he championed while in office but that Bowser has dialed back or abandoned.

Whether Gray can mount a political comeback similar to that of Marion Barry, who died in 2014, remains to be seen. Although Barry won the Ward 8 seat following an arrest for cocaine possession, Gray’s support remains hard to fully gauge. Some in attendance Saturday were from outside Ward 7 and will be unable to vote for him in June, and some longtime supporters have already pledged support elsewhere.

Gray also will have to answer questions about the loss of a planned Walmart in Ward 7 that he broke ground for in his final year saying that it was a done deal. That deal fell apart this year, and Gray blamed Bowser, who in turn said her predecessor had left work undone on the project.

Gray said he would count on those in the half-full sanctuary to be his ambassadors, and he credited them for helping him through the years under investigation. “You stood by me,” he said. “Without you, I would not be here.”

“Just so you know,” he added, “I have moved forward, and while I’m moving forward, I won’t forget what happened, because I don’t want that to happen to somebody else.”