The legislative trail reveals that major regulated operators—led by the Sports Betting Alliance (which represents heavyweight platforms like FanDuel, DraftKings, and BetMGM)—were front and center submitting testimony in support. Licensed operators wanted to plug the black-market drain on local tax dollars and market share. Financial and technology advocates, like the Maryland Bankers Association represented by Evan Richards, engaged directly to iron out execution details around liability and payment transaction blocking.

The Annapolis Blueprint: Who Pushed HB 1226 Across the Line

A policy shift of this magnitude rarely happens by accident. The Maryland Illegal Online Gambling Enforcement Act was driven through the General Assembly by key legislative leaders who recognized that protecting the state’s digital border is essential to securing its fiscal future.

Leading the charge in the House, Delegate J. Sandy Bartlett (D-Anne Arundel)—Vice Chair of the House Judiciary Committee—co-sponsored HB 1226. Delegate Bartlett handles complex statutory mechanics with sharp precision, steering the enforcement tools smoothly through committee. She was joined by Delegate Frank M. Conaway Jr. (D-Baltimore City). Beyond his distinctive, unfiltered worldview, Conaway remains a remarkably effective legislator who quietly knows how to move critical policy through the chamber.

On the Senate side, Vice Chair of Judicial Proceedings Senator Jeff Waldstreicher teamed up with Senator Chris West to shepherd the cross-filed SB 652. Legal insiders across the Senate continuously point out that Waldstreicher is easily the sharpest legal mind in the entire chamber. While Senate leadership dynamics often lean heavily into regional, gender, and racial balancing when handing out committee chairs, Waldstreicher’s intellectual heavy lifting in Judicial Proceedings remains the backbone of complex state legal policy.

Working alongside Attorney General Anthony Brown’s office and major industry stakeholders—including the Sports Betting Alliance representing regulated giants like DraftKings, FanDuel, and BetMGM—these lawmakers built a clean regulatory standard.

This in-depth reporting and analysis is available exclusively to paid subscribers of The Maryland Wire. To read the rest of this article and access our full archive of executive briefings and investigative reporting, upgrade your subscription below.

The State’s Strategy: Squeezing the Offshore Supply Chain

When dealing with illegal online casinos and sportsbooks operated out of off-jurisdiction havens (such as Curaçao, Costa Rica, or Antigua), the state faces a stark reality: Maryland state law enforcement cannot serve a warrant or enforce a subpoena on an offshore entity that ignores international treaties or U.S. tariffs.

Instead of chasing bad actors overseas, Maryland is turning to a chokepoint strategy:

• Targeting the Domestic Infrastructure: The new law empowers the Office of the Attorney General (OAG) to issue administrative Cease and Desist orders not just to the illegal operators, but to the middleware—the web hosts, domain registrars, geofencing providers, and advertising platforms facilitating access.

• Financial Chokeholds: Under the statute, payment processors, credit card networks, and banks face formal notification to block transactions to flagged accounts. If an offshore site cannot process a card transaction or clear a wire, its local business model collapses.

• Consumer Protection Framework: Violations fall under the Maryland Consumer Protection Act as unfair or deceptive trade practices, giving the OAG civil and criminal tools to freeze assets, claw back illicit profits, and issue ex parte injunctions.

The Viewpoints: How Key Players Are Positioning

1. The Brick-and-Mortar Casinos (MGM National Harbor, Live! Casino, Horseshoe, etc.)

• The Reality: Maryland’s commercial casinos watched legislative efforts to legalize full iGaming (online slots and table games) stall out.

• The Stance: Land-based operators view the October 1 enforcement law as a necessary defense. Unregulated offshore sites and unregulated “sweepstakes-style” platforms drain potential foot traffic and gaming volume without paying state taxes or contributing to local education funds. Shutting down black-market digital leaks protects their physical floors and keeps mobile sports betting dollars within authorized, licensed channels.

2. The Licensed Gambling Platforms & Industry Lobbyists

• The Reality: Licensed operators pay state tax rates and enforce mandatory responsible-gaming controls.

• The Stance: Through advocacy groups like the Sports Betting Alliance, legal sportsbooks strongly backed aggressive action against grey-market and black-market operators. Every dollar diverted from an offshore book to a regulated platform increases taxable handle and keeps the market clean.

3. The Banking & Fintech Compromise

• The Strategy: Financial advocates, led in committee hearings by the Maryland Bankers Association, actively negotiated implementation details. Financial institutions worked to ensure clean statutory wording so banks aren’t penalized when shutting down complex, mislabeled transaction attempts.

4. The Government Relations Angle & Long Game

• The Long Game: Lobbyists pushing for full iGaming know they cannot win a statewide referendum in future sessions if lawmakers believe the online space is an unpoliced Wild West. By helping the state clean up illegal online operators now, advocates build the regulatory argument that Maryland can safely manage, tax, and police a fully legalized online casino market down the road.

Power, Politics, and Price Hikes: Inside BGE’s Annapolis Defense Matrix

Baltimore Gas and Electric (BGE) is navigating one of its most turbulent regulatory stretches in recent memory. Facing mounting consumer backlash, public regulatory pushback, and a shifting legislative landscape, Maryland’s largest utility is relying on a formidable network of inside and contract lobbyists to protect its financial bottom line.

The Rate Controversy: Why Everyone Is Talking About BGE

The primary driver of the current friction is BGE’s use of Multi-Year Rate Plans (MRPs). Unlike traditional rate cases where utilities seek cost recovery after projects are built, MRPs allow BGE to set rates years in advance based on projected spending.

• Distribution Hikes: BGE’s second MRP, approved by the Maryland Public Service Commission (PSC) for 2024–2026, locked in continuous base rate increases for electricity and natural gas.

• The "True-Up" Battle: The controversy peaked when BGE requested a massive $152.3 million reconciliation ("true-up") for overspending during its first multi-year plan.

• The Regulatory Crackdown: Highlighting growing utility unaffordability, the PSC slashed BGE's requested reconciliation by roughly half—approving $77.2 million. The General Assembly stepped in to ban future MRP true-up mechanisms altogether.

• Exelon's Parent Company Pressure: The Maryland Office of People’s Counsel (OPC) has openly criticized BGE’s parent company, Exelon Corporation, pointing out that BGE’s annual profits climbed over $500 million in 2024. The OPC argues ratepayers are shouldering continuous hikes to meet parent company earnings targets.

This in-depth reporting and analysis is available exclusively to paid subscribers of The Maryland Wire. To read the rest of this article and access our full archive of executive briefings and investigative reporting, upgrade your subscription below.

The Advocacy Roster: Strengths and Weaknesses

To navigate the legislative and regulatory scrutiny in Annapolis, BGE deploys a mix of internal executives and top-tier lobbying firms.

1. Brittany Jones & In-House Affairs Team

• Role: Director of Government and External Affairs; oversees BGE's Annapolis operations alongside primary in-house lobbyist Benjamin F. Andes IV.

• Strengths: Executive-level access, direct integration with Exelon’s corporate strategy, and daily presence in the statehouse during legislative sessions.

• Weaknesses: In-house teams carry corporate baggage. When public anger over monthly bills reaches a boiling point, internal corporate officers face institutional pushback from lawmakers facing upset constituents.

2. Harris Jones & Malone, LLC (Lisa Harris Jones & Sean Malone)

• Role: Primary contract lobbying firm for BGE in Annapolis.

• Strengths: Widely considered one of Maryland's premier government relations firms. Lisa Harris Jones brings deep relationships across the General Assembly and executive branch, paired with top-notch strategic maneuvering.

• Weaknesses: Because the firm represents high-profile commercial clients, legislative opponents often frame their involvement as corporate special interest lobbying, making populism-driven consumer bills harder to neutralize.

3. Schwartz, Metz, Wise & Kauffman, P.A. (J. Steven Wise)

• Role: External legal and regulatory contract lobbyists.

• Strengths: Exceptional technical and legal command of Maryland statutory law and utility regulation. Vital for dissecting complex energy policy, PSC mandates, and statutory ratemaking rules.

• Weaknesses: Highly legalistic advocacy can struggle in the court of public opinion. Technical policy arguments often carry less weight in committee rooms when public outcry over high utility bills dominates the room.

4. John Quinn

• Role: Veteran energy contract lobbyist.

• Strengths: Decades of institutional knowledge in energy regulation, grid modernization, and utility policy. Knows the mechanics of House Deregulated Energy and Senate Finance committees inside and out.

• Weaknesses: Representing traditional utility frameworks can create friction with progressive lawmakers pushing aggressive, immediate decarbonization and electrification timelines.

The Outlook

BGE’s legal and lobbying team faces a tougher landscape in Annapolis. With the PSC taking a firmer stance on spending overruns and lawmakers capping reconciliation mechanisms, the utility's traditional playbook is under pressure. Moving into the next rate cycle, BGE's advocacy machine will need to shift from defending aggressive rate increases to managing a state government increasingly intent on capping utility costs for Maryland consumers.

Forget polling, fundraising and approval ratings for a moment. From the

Governor and First Lady to senators, delegates, candidates, strategists, lobbyists and the people working behind the curtain, Maryland politics has a surprisingly attractive bench.

By The Maryland Wire

Maryland politics ranks practically everything.

Who has the most power? Who raises the most money? Who passed the most bills? Who has the governor’s ear? Who is running for what?

More importantly, who is obviously running for something while insisting they have not given it a single thought?

Today, The Maryland Wire is conducting a considerably less consequential investigation.

Who are some of the most attractive people in Maryland politics in 2026?

Before Annapolis loses its collective mind, there are rules.

First, this list is not ranked.

There were no ballots. No absentee votes. No recount. No poll watchers. Nobody filed an election challenge.

Attractiveness is subjective. The sources throughout this article establish who these people are and what connects them to Maryland politics. They obviously cannot prove that somebody has beautiful eyes, great hair or an irresistible smile.

Maryland has not yet established a State Board of Attractiveness.

Give Annapolis time.

Most importantly, Maryland politics does not mean elected officials alone.

Lobbyists count. Strategists count. Candidates count. Political staffers count. Government affairs professionals count. Party activists count. Communicators count.

Political spouses with substantial political résumés of their own count.

The people standing three feet behind the politician whispering, “Please stop talking,” definitely count.

So here they are.

The people who prove that public policy may occasionally be ugly, but Maryland politics certainly does not have to be.

Wes Moore

Yes, Governor Wes Moore appears first.

No, that does not mean he won.

We said this isn’t ranked.

Wes and Dawn Moore are simply appearing first because they are Maryland’s First Couple and The Maryland Wire possesses at least a modest instinct for political survival.

That said, putting Wes Moore on an attractiveness list does not exactly require creative accounting.

Moore brings an athletic build, enormous smile, excellent tailoring and the posture of a man whose résumé includes military service.

More importantly, he has presence.

Moore can appear in a tailored suit, rolled up sleeves or athletic clothes and somehow look equally comfortable in all three.

The look: Governor meets leading man.

What stands out: Smile, physique, suits and confidence.

Moore is Maryland’s 63rd governor and the first Black governor in the state’s history.

Office of Governor Wes Moore⁠

Dawn Flythe Moore

The Governor may have gotten the first spot, but Maryland’s First Lady certainly wasn’t getting buried somewhere around Number 17.

More importantly, Dawn Flythe Moore belongs here independently of her husband.

Her political résumé predates the Moore administration by decades. Her official biography documents more than 20 years in state government, nonprofit management, campaign strategy, fundraising and community engagement. She also helped architect the 2022 campaign that elected her husband governor.

Her appearance is equally distinctive.

Elegant. Sophisticated. Fashion conscious without looking overdone.

Dawn understands the difference between wearing clothes and actually having style.

The look: First Lady elegance with political insider credentials.

What stands out: Style, hair, smile and sophistication.

Office of First Lady Dawn Moore⁠

Angela Alsobrooks

Senator Angela Alsobrooks has mastered something considerably harder than simply being attractive.

She looks polished while campaigning.

Anyone who has spent an August afternoon at a Maryland political festival should understand why that deserves additional credit.

Alsobrooks combines a bright smile, feminine style and commanding presence with the confidence of someone who moved from Prince George’s County politics to the United States Senate.

She was elected to the Senate in 2024 after serving as Prince George’s County Executive and, before that, becoming the youngest person and first woman elected Prince George’s County State’s Attorney.

The look: Elegant, feminine and powerful.

What stands out: Smile, hair, wardrobe and presence.

Office of Senator Angela Alsobrooks⁠

Adrian Boafo

Adrian Boafo may be one of Maryland politics’ strongest arguments that the standard political suit does not have to be boring.

Boafo brings youth, fashion and considerable camera presence.

There is personality in the presentation.

He looks like someone who selected his clothes rather than somebody who discovered a navy suit hanging on the back of an office door five minutes before an event.

Boafo was also elected as a Maryland delegate to the 2024 Democratic National Convention from Congressional District 5.

The look: Modern political style with swagger.

What stands out: Fashion, smile and camera presence.

Source: Maryland State Board of Elections.

Jake Day

Maryland Housing Secretary and former Salisbury Mayor Jake Day brings an entirely different aesthetic.

Clean cut. Athletic. Military bearing.

Day has the sort of appearance that seems equally believable behind a government podium, standing outside a construction site or appearing in a campaign commercial nobody has actually announced yet.

He currently leads the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development and serves in Governor Moore’s Cabinet.

If somebody eventually makes a Maryland politics calendar, Day should probably expect a telephone call.

The look: All American political leading man.

What stands out: Athletic appearance, grooming and smile.

Source: Maryland DHCD leadership biography⁠

Courtney Finklea Green

Courtney Finklea Green represents precisely why this article had to move beyond elected office.

Green currently serves as Maryland State Deputy Treasurer, placing her inside one of the state’s major financial institutions while maintaining an active presence in Democratic politics.

In 2024, she was elected as a Democratic National Convention delegate from Maryland’s 5th Congressional District.

Her political presentation is considerably more glamorous than traditional Annapolis understatement.

Green’s look is unapologetically polished: long dark hair, dramatic eyes, a signature red lip and sharply tailored fashion. Her style combines political authority with glamour rather than treating the two as mutually exclusive.

In a political culture where women were once practically encouraged to dress as though personal style constituted an ethics violation, Green takes another approach.

The look: Political glamour without apology.

What stands out: Eyes, hair, red lip, tailoring and presence.

Sources: Maryland State Board of Elections, Maryland State Archives and AFRO American Newspapers.

Sarah Peters

Here is where the lobbyists begin fighting back.

Sarah Peters is a major presence in Annapolis government affairs and Maryland’s lobbying world.

She brings polished professional style and the kind of confidence that comes from regularly walking into rooms filled with powerful people and explaining why they should listen to you.

Maryland Ethics Commission records continue to identify Peters among the state’s registered lobbying professionals.

The look: Annapolis power professional.

What stands out: Professional polish, style and confidence.

This is precisely the sort of person an elected officials only attractiveness list would completely miss.

Vanessa Atterbeary

Vanessa Atterbeary has long had one of the more polished presentations in Maryland politics.

She combines professional style with a striking appearance and unmistakable confidence.

Atterbeary has the sort of presence that makes disappearing into the background of a political room rather difficult.

The look: Sophisticated and commanding.

What stands out: Eyes, hair, wardrobe and confidence.

Sources: Maryland General Assembly and Maryland State Board of Elections.

Eddie Pounds

Eddie Pounds gives Maryland’s government affairs community another strong entry.

His appeal is polished and mature.

Pounds has the kind of professional presentation that looks completely at home in Annapolis without appearing as though he purchased the Official Lobbyist Starter Kit.

State Ethics Commission records document Pounds’ continued presence in Maryland’s lobbying community.

The look: Distinguished government affairs charm.

What stands out: Grooming, smile and professional style.

Apparently lobbying legislation and looking good while doing it are not mutually exclusive.

Senator William C. Smith Jr.

Senator William C. Smith Jr. brings the handsome attorney category into the competition.

Polished lawyer. Military background. Tailored suits. Understated confidence.

Smith does not appear to be trying particularly hard to look stylish.

That is usually when style works best.

The look: The handsome lawyer who actually read the bill.

What stands out: Suits, grooming and presence.

Source: Maryland General Assembly.

Sarah Mogul

Sarah Mogul brings Baltimore’s communications and political organizing world into the conversation.

Her inclusion illustrates another important point about this list.

Political influence does not begin and end at the State House. Communicators, organizers, consultants and the people helping shape political conversations belong to Maryland’s political ecosystem too.

Mogul brings a more creative and less traditional aesthetic than standard Annapolis political style.

The look: Baltimore creative meets political communicator.

What stands out: Natural appearance, style and personality.

Judy Danso

Judy Danso represents another side of Prince George’s County’s government and political

establishment.

Her public service résumé has included senior leadership work in the Prince George’s County

State’s Attorney’s Office.

Danso brings polished professional style and contemporary presence to the field.

The look: Professional political energy with polish.

What stands out: Style, smile and presence.

Source: Maryland State Archives.

Mollie Byron

Mollie Byron brings classic Annapolis sophistication.

Her career has placed her inside Maryland government and political circles where appointments, personnel and politics intersect.

Her appearance fits the environment.

Nothing appears forced. Nothing needs to scream for attention.

The look: Understated elegance.

What stands out: Professional polish and sophistication.

No sequins required.

Sources: Maryland State Archives and Office of the Governor.

Will Jawando

Will Jawando has one of the best smiles in Maryland politics.

There.

We said it.

Jawando combines that smile with an athletic appearance and approachable style that works particularly well in public life.

The look: Handsome dad meets polished politician.

What stands out: Smile, build and approachability.

The ability to still look good after shaking hundreds of hands at a political event should probably count as a specialized skill.

Source: Montgomery County government.

Anthony Brown

Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown proves this list has a silver fox division.

Brown brings mature attractiveness, excellent grooming and the posture one might expect from a longtime military officer.

His style has become more distinguished with age rather than less effective.

The look: Statesman.

What stands out: Fitness, grooming and military bearing.

Some people age out of political heartthrob territory.

Brown apparently filed an extension.

Source: Office of the Maryland Attorney General.

Michele Guyton

Delegate Michele Guyton brings warmth and an approachable style to the list.

Her presentation is less about political glamour and more about looking naturally polished.

That distinction matters.

Not everyone needs to look like they are headed to a gala after the hearing.

The look: Smart, warm and naturally polished.

What stands out: Smile and approachable style.

Source: Maryland General Assembly.

Megan Outten

Megan Outten brings a fresh, approachable look to Eastern Shore politics.

The former Salisbury City Councilwoman is also an Emerge Maryland Class of 2025 alumna and a 2026 candidate for Wicomico County Council.

However, this is an attractiveness list, not a résumé competition.

Outten has a youthful, natural prettiness, expressive light eyes and a bright smile. Her style is contemporary and polished without looking overly styled, giving her the kind of approachable appearance that works especially well in local politics.

The look: Eastern Shore girl next door meets rising political candidate.

What stands out: Eyes, smile, youthful appearance and natural style.

Sources: City of Salisbury, Maryland State Board of Elections and Emerge Maryland.

Jordan Hines

Jordan Hines represents the younger generation operating inside Maryland Democratic politics.

His political work has included campaign, party and organizing roles.

Political staffers and operatives are frequently standing immediately outside the camera frame

while elected officials receive all the attention.

With Hines, not today.

The look: Young political professional.

What stands out: Modern style and youthful presentation.

Manny Welsh

Manny Welsh represents another portion of Maryland politics that voters rarely rank but insiders know very well.

Welsh has held senior positions in Maryland government and serves in the Moore administration.

His inclusion gives the list another behind the scenes figure instead of another predictable elected official.

The look: Executive branch polish.

What stands out: Professional presentation and understated style.

Sources: Office of the Governor and Maryland State Archives.

Kelly Schulz

Beauty is bipartisan.

Former Maryland Commerce Secretary and Republican gubernatorial candidate Kelly Schulz makes sure nobody can accuse this article of believing attractive people exist only in the Democratic Party.

Schulz brings blond hair, a bright smile and a polished but approachable appearance that translated naturally to statewide campaigning.

The look: Republican girl next door meets cabinet secretary.

What stands out: Hair, smile and approachable style.

Sources: Maryland State Archives and Maryland State Board of Elections.

Jesse Pippy

Delegate Jesse Pippy gives Maryland Republicans another entry.

The Frederick County Republican brings a clean cut appearance, attorney polish and younger

energy than the stereotypical image of an Annapolis legislator.

The look: Conservative clean cut.

What stands out: Hair, grooming and professional style.

Politics aside, the hair understands the assignment.

Source: Maryland General Assembly.

Senator Ron Watson

Prince George’s County Senator Ron Watson brings mature style, confidence and presence.

His professional background and elected service give him a distinctly executive appearance.

The look: Distinguished and confident.

What stands out: Smile, grooming and presence.

Maryland politics’ mature gentleman division is becoming unexpectedly competitive.

Source: Maryland General Assembly.

Delegate Kris Valderrama

Delegate Kriselda “Kris” Valderrama brings warmth and familiarity to the list.

Valderrama combines long hair, a warm smile and an approachable presentation that has remained remarkably consistent throughout years in public life.

The look: Warm and feminine.

What stands out: Hair and smile.

Source: Maryland General Assembly.

Ava Zakikhani

Ava Zakikhani is another reminder that some of Maryland politics’ interesting faces are nowher near a ballot.

Her work in policy and government affairs places her among a younger generation operating around Maryland’s political institutions.

That is precisely the population this article would miss if we simply opened the General Assembly roster and started selecting names.

The look: Young policy professional meets Annapolis.

What stands out: Youthful style and professional presentation.

Matthew Pica

Lobbyist Matthew Pica survived an extremely competitive final cut.

His appeal is clean cut and athletic with a distinctly preppy Annapolis quality.

Maryland Ethics Commission records confirm Pica’s place in the state’s lobbying ecosystem.

The look: Government affairs meets country club.

What stands out: Athletic appearance and clean cut style.

This article promised to look beyond people whose names appear on yard signs.

Promise kept.

So, What Did We Learn?

Something became obvious while assembling this list.

Maryland’s attractive political class looks considerably different once you leave the State House chamber.

There are governors and senators. There are delegates and candidates. There are Democrats and Republicans. There are lobbyists, strategists, political organizers and government officials whose names most voters may never see on a statewide ballot.

There are people who make policy and people who influence the people making policy.

There are younger political professionals and members of the increasingly formidable silver fox division.

There are glamorous people and understated people.

There are people who look great in a suit and people whose appeal has considerably more to do with their smile, confidence or presence.

That is what makes the list interesting.

It is also why there is deliberately no ranking.

Wes Moore appears first because he is Maryland’s governor.

Dawn Moore appears immediately afterward because she is Maryland’s First Lady, a political professional in her own right and certainly was not getting buried somewhere near the bottom.

Angela Alsobrooks follows because she is a United States senator and one of Maryland’s most recognizable political figures.

After that?

Fight among yourselves.

Attractiveness is subjective.

Political power changes.

Fashion changes.

Hairlines occasionally change.

One conclusion, however, seems reasonably safe.

For a state that spends an extraordinary amount of time arguing about taxes, transportation, budgets, elections and committee assignments, Maryland politics is a surprisingly good looking business.

About This List

This feature is entertainment and political culture commentary. Attractiveness is inherently subjective. Inclusion reflects a combination of appearance, style, grooming, charisma, presentation and political presence.

The list deliberately includes people from different parts of Maryland’s political ecosystem rather than limiting eligibility to elected officials.

Most importantly, placement should not be interpreted as a numerical ranking of attractiveness. The opening reflects political protocol and editorial flow rather than a beauty score.

The sources establish political positions, professional roles and participation in Maryland politics. They do not establish whether somebody is attractive.

That decision belongs to the reader.

Judging by Maryland politics, readers will have opinions.

Principal Sources

The factual biographical information in this feature was checked against official and primary

sources wherever available, including the Office of Governor Wes Moore⁠, Office of First Lady

Dawn Moore⁠, Office of Senator Angela Alsobrooks⁠, Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development, Maryland State Board of Elections, Maryland General Assembly,

Maryland State Archives, Maryland State Ethics Commission and local government records.

Current state lobbying records, for example, document Sarah Peters, Eddie Pounds and Matthew Pica in Maryland’s government affairs ecosystem.

Editor’s note: This is a subjective political culture feature, not a ranking of professional

Beyond the Policy Room: Why Mary Kane Is Exactly What Maryland’s Free Enterprise System Needs Right Now

By The Maryland Wire

When people talk about the modern policy battlefield in Annapolis, the conversation often turns to legislative majorities, committee control, and agency budgets. But those who actually understand how economies function know that policy is only half the equation. The other half is enterprise.

If you want to understand who is fighting for the engine that actually pays the state’s bills, look no further than Mary Kane.

As President and CEO of the Maryland Chamber of Commerce, Kane occupies a unique, critical space in the state’s political ecosystem. She isn’t an ideological throw-thrower, nor is she a reactive lobbyist simply waiting for bills to hit the floor in January. She is a seasoned, steady executive who views commerce through a global and national lens—and brings that broader perspective back home to Maryland.

Read more

The Annapolis Power Shift: Who’s Winning, Who’s Losing, and the New Rules of Maryland Labor

Patrick Moran’s recent election as International President of AFSCME isn't just a personal career milestone—it is a signal flare for where political power is moving in Maryland.

For years, standard political reporting framed Maryland labor as a monolithic block: strong, public-sector-heavy, and aligned with State House leadership. But if you look under the hood of the Moore administration, the reality is far more dynamic. Labor in Maryland isn't rising or falling as a single unit. It is splitting into two distinct speed lanes:

• The Expansion Zone: Statutory gains have fueled unprecedented growth in white-collar public sectors, state middle management, public defenders, and cultural institutions like county library systems and major art museums.

• The Friction Zone: Private-sector logistics, traditional manufacturing, and university systems face structural budget drag, employer pushback, and stagnant density.

Understanding who is winning and who is losing is only half the story. The real story for insiders is how labor power is being exercised inside State Circle.

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Subscribe to The Maryland Wire to read the rest of this analysis, including how state government affairs teams are leveraging labor fractures to pass—or kill—legislation in Annapolis.

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The Death of the Old Annapolis Playbook

The traditional model of statecraft was linear: interest groups lobbied the Governor’s legislative team, executive agencies negotiated separately with public unions, and corporate affairs teams fought their battles in General Assembly committee rooms.

That three-tier system is dead. Today, top Annapolis government affairs directors and labor chiefs frequently bypass intermediate agency bureaucracies entirely. Instead, they form direct, bilateral coalitions to pre-package deals for the Moore administration and legislative leaders before bills ever see a committee hearing.

When a major policy or development project aligns a public-sector union with state business interests, it creates an almost unstoppable force in Senate Finance or House Economic Matters. But that dynamic works both ways.

The Counter-Play: How Lobbyists Split Labor to Kill Bills

For corporate strategists and government affairs teams looking to defeat unfavorable legislation, the objective is rarely to fight labor head-on. The highest-yield strategy in Annapolis opposition politics is driving wedges into the labor coalition itself.

Organized labor in Maryland is composed of distinct factions whose interests routinely clash:

OPPOSITION STRATEGY

┌─────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────┐

▼ ▼

BUILDING TRADES & CONSTRUCTION PUBLIC SECTOR UNIONS

(Building Trades Councils) (AFSCME, MSEA)

• Focus: Job volume, capital projects, • Focus: Agency budgets, staffing,

procurement, economic development workplace rules, benefit steps

└─────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────┘

▼

LEGISLATIVE FRICTION

(Coalition fractures; bill stalls in committee)

• Peeling Off the Trades: When complex regulatory, environmental, or procurement mandates threaten to slow down major projects, savvy state lobbyists do not go to the media; they go directly to the Building Trades. Showing that a bill delays construction or reduces man-hours turns building trade unions into active opposition, crippling the bill's momentum.

• Exposing Operational Costs: When proposed legislation creates unfunded mandates that strain state agency operations, public-sector unions like AFSCME will fight the administrative burden to protect their members' working conditions, even if the bill is sponsored by friendly allies.

Why This Matters for the Moore Administration

The Moore administration relies heavily on maintaining a unified coalition. When a government affairs team successfully highlights a policy rift—forcing the executive branch to choose between building trades and public-sector workers—the administration will almost always pull back to avoid picking a winner between key political allies.

In modern Annapolis, stopping a bill doesn't require winning a floor debate. It requires knowing precisely where the fault lines lie between State Circle, the bargaining table, and the union hall—and placing the wedge right in the middle.

ByThe Maryland Wire

The Machine Didn’t Die — It Broke Apart

Mike Miller is gone. Steny Hoyer is retiring. The two men who helped define Maryland political power for generations are disappearing from the map. Nobody has inherited all of what they controlled. Instead, Maryland power has fractured among Wes Moore, legislative leaders, county organizations, federal figures and a new generation fighting to connect the pieces.

By The Maryland Wire

For decades, there were two names in Maryland politics that required almost no explanation.

Mike Miller.

Steny Hoyer.

You didn’t necessarily have to agree with them.

You didn’t even have to like them.

But everyone understood something:

THEY HAD POWER.

Not social-media power.

Not cable-news power.

Not the temporary power that comes from one big election.

They possessed political infrastructure.

Relationships.

Institutional memory.

Donors.

Staff.

Allies.

County leaders.

Lobbyists.

Legislators.

Operatives.

And the ability to connect people who needed something with people capable of delivering it.

Today one is gone.

The other is preparing to leave Congress after more than four decades.

And Maryland faces a question it hasn’t had to answer in generations:

Who runs Maryland now?

The answer may be:

Nobody.

At least not the way Miller once did.

Maryland’s old machine wasn’t inherited by one person.

It fragmented.

And now several ambitious political networks are competing to assemble the pieces.

MIKE MILLER WASN’T JUST SENATE PRESIDENT

Miller presided over the Maryland Senate for 33 years, becoming one of the longest-serving legislative leaders in American history. He stepped down as Senate president in 2019 and died in January 2021. (Behavioral and Social Sciences)

But Miller’s real power wasn’t the title printed on his door.

It was the accumulation of relationships behind it.

Miller came from Maryland’s old Democratic organization and developed into an extraordinarily adaptable political operator, retaining authority even as the Senate around him became younger and more liberal. (The Washington Post)

He understood something fundamental:

politics is information.

Who wants what?

Who owes whom?

Which senator needs help?

Which county executive wants something in the budget?

Which committee chairman can move a bill?

Which lobbyist represents which client?

Which candidate should receive support today because that candidate could be a senator ten years from now?

Miller knew the answers because he’d spent decades collecting them.

AND HIS PEOPLE SPREAD EVERYWHERE

Miller’s influence wasn’t confined to elected officials.

Former Miller aides became prominent Annapolis lobbyists.

Maryland Matters noted figures such as Joseph Bryce and Timothy Perry among the high-profile lobbyists who had once served as top Miller aides. (Maryland Matters)

That was one of Miller’s greatest political achievements.

He didn’t merely accumulate power around himself.

He produced alumni.

Staffers became lobbyists.

Legislators became committee chairs.

Allies became power brokers.

And decades of relationships reinforced one another.

By the end, Mike Miller wasn’t simply a person.

He was an ecosystem.

THEN THERE WAS STENY HOYER

Hoyer’s network was different.

Miller’s power was rooted in Annapolis.

Hoyer connected Maryland to Washington.

He served in the Maryland Senate before winning election to Congress in 1981 and ultimately became one of the longest-serving members of the U.S. House and a longtime No. 2 in House Democratic leadership. In January 2026, Hoyer announced that he would retire rather than seek another term. (The Washington Post)

His influence stretched through:

Prince George’s County,

Southern Maryland,

Congress,

federal agencies,

donors,

campaign organizations,

and generations of Democratic candidates.

And Hoyer had something machine builders value enormously:

a succession network.

That became obvious almost immediately.

THE HOYER SUCCESSION TEST

When Hoyer announced his retirement, Maryland’s 5th Congressional District exploded with candidates.

Twenty-four Democrats entered the race.

But when the votes were counted, the winner was Adrian Boafo, Hoyer’s former campaign manager.

Boafo wasn’t running without establishment help.

He was endorsed by Hoyer.

He was endorsed by Governor Wes Moore.

And he ultimately won the Democratic nomination. (AP News)

In his victory speech, Boafo described the result as voters deciding it was time to “pass the torch to a new generation of leaders.” (AP News)

That phrase captures the transition perfectly.

Hoyer’s seat isn’t simply being vacated.

Parts of his network are being transferred.

But they aren’t being transferred to another Steny Hoyer.

They’re being absorbed into a newer political constellation.

And standing prominently inside that constellation is Wes Moore.

WES MOORE IS THE CLOSEST THING MARYLAND HAS TO THE CENTER

If someone forces you to name the single person sitting nearest the center of Maryland Democratic politics today, the answer is Governor Wes Moore.

The 2026 Democratic gubernatorial primary underscored the scale of his position.

Moore won renomination overwhelmingly, receiving roughly 88% of the Democratic primary vote. (WBAL-TV)

But raw votes tell only part of the story.

Look at the party infrastructure.

The Maryland Democratic Party says Steuart Pittman ran for state party chairman in 2025 “at the suggestion of Governor Wes Moore.” Pittman took office that July. (The Maryland Democratic Party)

That’s important.

Governors traditionally influence their state parties.

But party leadership plus fundraising, endorsements, executive appointments and national relationships creates the beginning of something bigger:

a political network that could survive the governor’s term.

Moore also played a role in the Hoyer succession by backing Boafo.

That’s how political organizations reproduce themselves.

You support tomorrow’s politician today.

BUT WES MOORE ISN’T MIKE MILLER

And that’s the distinction that matters.

Moore has enormous statewide visibility.

Miller had decades of accumulated legislative control.

Moore can endorse candidates.

Miller could influence the environment in which legislators lived every day.

Committee assignments.

Leadership positions.

Legislative priorities.

Relationships that had been accumulating since before many current lawmakers entered politics.

Moore may have a larger national profile than Miller ever possessed.

But he doesn’t possess Miller’s half-century of Annapolis memory.

Nobody does.

Which is why the modern Maryland political structure looks less like a pyramid and more like several power centers connected by overlapping relationships.

BILL FERGUSON HAS THE SENATE

One of those centers belongs to Senate President Bill Ferguson.

Ferguson controls an institution no governor can simply command.

The Senate.

Maryland’s official 2026 legislative records identify Ferguson as Senate President. (Maryland General Assembly)

That means influence over:

committee structure,

Senate leadership,

legislative priorities,

confirmations,

and negotiations with the House and governor.

But Ferguson is not Mike Miller 2.0.

Miller’s extraordinary longevity allowed him to become almost inseparable from the institution.

Ferguson possesses the office.

Miller possessed the office plus decades of political mythology and accumulated relationships.

Those aren’t the same thing.

JOSELINE PEÑA-MELNYK HAS THE HOUSE

The House now has its own new center of gravity.

Official 2026 legislative records identify Joseline Peña-Melnyk as Speaker of the House of Delegates, alongside Ferguson as Senate President. (Maryland General Assembly)

That makes the current Maryland governing triangle:

MOORE + FERGUSON + PEÑA-MELNYK.

Executive power.

Senate power.

House power.

None fully controls the others.

And that fact alone demonstrates how different modern Maryland is from the Miller era.

The governor proposes.

The legislature disposes.

Committee leaders negotiate.

County interests intervene.

And political coalitions shift issue by issue.

That’s not one machine.

That’s a networked power structure.

ANGELA ALSOBROOKS HAS ANOTHER KIND OF POWER

Then there’s U.S. Senator Angela Alsobrooks.

Her significance isn’t that she is the new Hoyer.

She isn’t.

Hoyer spent decades constructing his network.

Alsobrooks brings something different:

Prince George’s County roots,

a statewide electoral organization,

a United States Senate platform,

and relationships with national Democratic leaders.

That makes her a critical bridge between Maryland and Washington at precisely the moment Hoyer leaves.

Hoyer’s retirement therefore doesn’t necessarily weaken Prince George’s influence.

It changes who carries it.

AISHA BRAVEBOY NOW CONTROLS A MAJOR COUNTY POWER CENTER

Prince George’s itself is undergoing a dramatic generational transition.

Official 2026 results show Aisha Braveboy winning the Democratic County Executive primary with 87,944 votes and 73.31% of the vote. (Maryland State Board of Elections)

That’s political infrastructure.

Prince George’s is one of Maryland’s central Democratic vote engines.

A county executive with that level of primary support gains:

appointments,

budget influence,

organizational relationships,

donor access,

and a platform for cultivating the next generation of political leadership.

Braveboy therefore isn’t merely another person on the Maryland power map.

She controls a place from which a political organization can be built.

ADRIAN BOAFO MAY BE THE FIRST REAL TEST OF THE TRANSFER

Boafo is particularly interesting because he sits almost perfectly at the intersection between the old and new worlds.

He worked for Hoyer.

Hoyer endorsed him.

Moore endorsed him.

Then Boafo beat an enormous Democratic field for Hoyer’s seat. (AP News)

That doesn’t make him powerful on Hoyer’s scale.

He’s just beginning.

But it illustrates how power actually transfers:

not through a ceremonial handoff,

but through endorsements,

donors,

staff,

relationships,

and voter confidence.

Boafo may become Hoyer’s congressional successor.

He will not automatically inherit Hoyer’s 40-plus years of political capital.

That part has to be rebuilt.

AND THEN THERE ARE THE PEOPLE WHO LOST SOMETHING WHEN MILLER LEFT

This is the part that often gets overlooked.

When a machine breaks apart, power doesn’t only move upward.

Some people’s relationships become less valuable.

Former Miller aides still know Annapolis.

Former Miller allies still possess institutional memory.

Veteran lobbyists don’t forget how legislation works.

But something fundamental disappeared when Miller did:

the common center.

The person capable of connecting all of them instantly was gone.

That changes the value of a political network.

Imagine knowing everybody in Annapolis.

Useful.

Now imagine the person who introduced many of those people, appointed committee chairs, influenced Senate priorities and understood decades of relationships is simultaneously Senate President.

Much more useful.

Remove that person and the individual relationships remain.

But the system becomes decentralized.

WHO BENEFITED FROM THE BREAKUP?

First:

Bill Ferguson.

The Senate’s institutional relationships now run through his leadership rather than Miller’s.

Second:

the House leadership.

With the Miller-Busch generation gone, today’s House leaders are building their own committee chairs, alliances and relationships.

Third:

Wes Moore.

Moore became governor after Miller was gone.

That distinction matters.

Earlier governors had to operate with Miller sitting across State Circle.

Moore entered office during a generational reset.

Instead of negotiating with the old machine, he has the opportunity to help build the next network.

Fourth:

Angela Alsobrooks and the emerging Prince George’s generation.

Hoyer is leaving.

Miller is gone.

The county’s political leadership now belongs to another generation.

Fifth:

politicians who were outside the old Miller organization.

When someone dominates an institution for 33 years, inevitably some politicians develop within that organization and others outside it.

Miller’s departure created room for people who may never have risen as quickly under the old structure.

BUT THERE IS NO SINGLE WINNER

That’s the biggest point.

If Mike Miller’s power had simply transferred to Bill Ferguson, Maryland would still have a machine.

If Hoyer’s influence simply transferred to Boafo, Maryland would still have a machine.

If every county leader simply took orders from Moore, Maryland would have a machine.

None of those things happened.

Instead:

Moore controls the statewide executive platform.

Ferguson controls the Senate.

Peña-Melnyk controls the House.

Alsobrooks has statewide and federal reach.

Braveboy has Prince George’s executive power.

Pittman leads the state Democratic Party after Moore encouraged him to seek the role. (The Maryland Democratic Party)

Boafo represents the beginning of the post-Hoyer congressional generation.

And Baltimore, Montgomery County, organized labor, donors and other county organizations maintain their own centers of influence.

That’s not one machine.

That’s several machines negotiating with one another.

FOLLOW THE ENDORSEMENTS

If you want to understand where Maryland power is moving, don’t simply watch office titles.

Watch endorsements.

Who does Moore support?

Who does Alsobrooks support?

Who gets Ferguson’s allies?

Who gets House leadership?

Who gets Hoyer’s blessing?

Who gets labor?

Who gets major donors?

And most importantly:

Who gets all of them at once?

That is where the new Maryland network becomes visible.

The Boafo race was a textbook example.

Hoyer’s successor didn’t emerge randomly from 24 candidates.

He had ties to the outgoing incumbent and support from the governor.

The old network and the emerging one overlapped.

And voters chose him. (AP News)

WATCH WHO MOORE BUILDS

Moore may ultimately become the most important person in determining whether Maryland develops another durable statewide political organization.

But the test isn’t whether Moore himself remains popular.

The test is what happens to the people he supports.

Which delegates become senators?

Which senators become committee chairs?

Which county officials become executives?

Which staffers become candidates?

Which appointees become statewide leaders?

Who gets his donor network?

Who gets his political advisers?

Who eventually gets his endorsement when Maryland faces a post-Moore gubernatorial succession fight?

That’s how we’ll know whether Moore was merely a successful governor—

or the founder of another generation of Maryland power.

AND DON’T IGNORE THE OLD SURVIVORS

There’s another category worth watching:

politicians who came from Miller’s Maryland but remain active in the new one.

Dereck Davis is one.

Anthony Brown is another.

Veteran legislators and former officials throughout the state still possess old relationships that newer politicians don’t.

These people can function as bridges.

That’s important because political systems rarely reset completely.

The new machine usually grows partly from pieces of the old one.

Donors don’t disappear.

Lobbyists don’t disappear.

Operatives don’t disappear.

Institutional memory doesn’t disappear.

They find new centers of gravity.

SO WHO RUNS MARYLAND?

If you want one name:

Wes Moore is currently closest to the center.

His overwhelming 2026 Democratic renomination, executive authority, national profile and influence within the Maryland Democratic Party make that difficult to dispute. (WBAL-TV)

But saying Moore “runs Maryland” the way Miller once ran the Senate would oversimplify the reality.

Maryland power today looks more like this:

WES MOORE

Statewide organization.
Appointments.
Fundraising.
Executive government.
National Democratic relationships.

BILL FERGUSON

The Senate.
Committees.
Confirmations.
Legislative leverage.

JOSELINE PEÑA-MELNYK

The House.
Committee leadership.
Budget and legislative leverage.

ANGELA ALSOBROOKS

Statewide electoral organization.
Federal platform.
Prince George’s relationships.
National Democratic connections.

AISHA BRAVEBOY

Prince George’s executive organization.
County government.
A major Democratic vote base.

THE POST-HOYER GENERATION

Boafo and the emerging political class that will have to rebuild Hoyer’s Washington-Maryland network rather than simply inherit it.

THE MACHINE DIDN’T DIE

It did something more interesting.

IT BROKE APART.

Mike Miller’s influence was too personal, too old and too deeply rooted in his own relationships to be inherited whole.

Hoyer’s network is too extensive and too intertwined with decades of congressional politics to fit neatly inside one successor.

So the pieces are moving.

Toward Moore.

Toward Ferguson.

Toward Peña-Melnyk.

Toward Alsobrooks.

Toward Braveboy.

Toward younger candidates and new county organizations.

And toward veteran political survivors who understand both eras.

THE REAL RACE IS TO CONNECT THE PIECES

That’s the next chapter of Maryland politics.

The person who eventually connects:

Annapolis,

Prince George’s,

Montgomery County,

Baltimore,

labor,

business,

donors,

the Maryland Democratic Party,

and the congressional delegation

will possess something Maryland hasn’t truly seen since Miller’s heyday.

Not merely another elected official.

A political system.

And maybe that’s why searching for “the next Mike Miller” is the wrong exercise.

There may never be another one.

The more important question is:

WHO BECOMES THE PERSON EVERYBODY ELSE HAS TO CALL?

Miller spent half a century becoming that person.

Hoyer spent decades becoming another version of it.

Maryland’s current political leaders are still competing for the privilege.

And until somebody actually connects all those pieces, the most accurate answer to the question “Who runs Maryland?” may be the most fascinating one of all:

No one does.

Not anymore.

But there are plenty of people trying.

Sources

University of Maryland and Maryland Matters — Miller’s 33-year Senate presidency and political legacy. (Behavioral and Social Sciences)

Washington Post historical reporting — Miller’s rise from Maryland machine politics and ability to retain power as the Senate evolved. (The Washington Post)

Maryland Matters — former top Miller aides who moved into Annapolis lobbying and the changing Senate power structure. (Maryland Matters)

Washington Post and Reuters — Hoyer’s January 2026 retirement announcement after more than four decades in Congress and his long Democratic leadership career. (The Washington Post)

Associated Press — Adrian Boafo’s 2026 victory in the Democratic primary to succeed Hoyer, including Hoyer and Moore’s support and Boafo’s “pass the torch” remarks. (AP News)

Maryland Democratic Party — Steuart Pittman’s official biography stating that he sought the state chairmanship at Moore’s suggestion. (The Maryland Democratic Party)

Maryland General Assembly — official 2026 records identifying Bill Ferguson as Senate President and Joseline Peña-Melnyk as Speaker. (Maryland General Assembly)

Maryland State Board of Elections — official 2026 Prince George’s County results showing Aisha Braveboy’s dominant County Executive primary victory. (Maryland State Board of Elections)

2026 election reporting — Moore’s overwhelming Democratic gubernatorial primary victory. (WBAL-TV)

When political observers map out the future of statewide leadership in Annapolis, the immediate focus naturally falls on the established names. However, inside real political strategy circles, the conversations are already looking ahead toward the 2030 cycle—and specifically at how Housing Secretary and former Salisbury Mayor Jake Day might construct a winning ticket.

One up and coming political strategist in Maryland recently laid out the tactical calculus for Day as he contemplates his next moves. While former Prince George’s County Executive Rushern Baker remains an obvious, highly accomplished, and deeply respected figure, a conventional two-man, center-left ticket carries obvious demographic and geographic limitations in modern Democratic primaries.

To build a broader statewide coalition, two alternative strategies emerge—each bringing distinct geographic strengths and political attributes to a potential ticket.

Option 1: The Baltimore Urban Play

• The Candidate: Councilwoman Phylicia Porter (Baltimore City Council, District 10).

• The Strategy: A partnership with Porter anchors the ticket securely in Baltimore City. Aligned with the influential political network surrounding State Senator Antonio Hayes, Porter brings an extensive background in public health policy, urban revitalization, and grassroots community organizing in South Baltimore.

• The Coalition: Combining Day’s Eastern Shore background and executive housing credentials with Porter’s urban policy focus creates a balanced regional dynamic across the I-95 corridor and Eastern Shore.

Option 2: The Prince George’s County Coalition

• The Candidate: Courtney Finklea Green.

• The Strategy: Selecting an emerging leader out of Prince George’s County directly targets the state's most critical Democratic primary voting bloc.

• The Coalition: Rather than relying on established regional figures, pairing Day’s executive resume with a strong, rising brand in Prince George's secures essential vote-getting power in Southern Maryland while offering a fresh generational narrative for the state.

Key Takeaways for 2030 Strategic Planning

• Demographic & Geographic Balance: Winning a Democratic primary in Maryland increasingly requires tickets to balance suburban, urban, and rural interests, alongside gender and racial representation.

• Beyond the Usual Suspects: While established figures offer instant name recognition, political strategists are increasingly eyeing hyper-local vote-getters who hold strong regional brands.

Many Strtegists Are Staying Mum

I reached out to Len Foxwell who is coming off of a hugely successful win with Adrian Boafo and has worked with all of these folks in the past. He declined to comment on these potential races because he said it's still too early.

The Great Prince George’s Backfire: How Council Infighting Just Boxed Out Its Own Sponsors

In political maneuvering, the first rule is simple: make sure the trap you build isn’t the one you step into.

In Prince George’s County, a contentious push to dismantle the Council’s two at-large seats is being pitched to voters as a structural cleanup. But behind the legislative jargon lies an act of raw political friction—a targeted attempt to undercut seasoned council rivals like Jolene Ivey and Sydney Harrison.

There’s just one major problem with the plan: as a matter of pure tactical math, it completely backfires on the very people pushing it.

The Math Doesn't Work

Even if a referendum passes to eliminate the at-large positions, charter rules don't retroactively boot sitting members out of office. Current at-large representatives are positioned to serve out their full terms. Furthermore, experienced leaders with deep roots retain their long-term viability—whether that means running for County Executive or returning to home district seats down the line after sitting out a cycle.

The immediate targets of this legislation will be just fine.

Removing Their Own Ladder

The real political damage lands squarely on the district members championing the change.

Under the current system, two-term district council members facing term limits rely on at-large seats as the primary stepping stone to extend their tenure on the Council for another eight years. By eliminating those seats out of sheer political spite, council members who are approaching their own district term limits are burning down the only bridge that would keep them in County Council office.

Instead of sidelining their rivals, the sponsors of this effort may have successfully engineered their own eventual removal from the legislative branch—leaving them with nowhere to run when their district clock runs out.

THEY WERE ALREADY HERE

Montgomery County’s Data Centers Were Hiding in Plain Sight

Before data centers became a political fight, an entire generation of future Maryland leaders was growing up around them. In 1999, future political figures were graduating from Springbrook, Montgomery Blair and Richard Montgomery while Montgomery County government was already documenting data-center operations in Rockville. They grew up. The data centers did too. Only one became a major political controversy.

THE CLASS OF ’99 HAD NO IDEA WHAT WAS COMING

Let’s go back to Montgomery County in 1999.

Bill Clinton was president.

Google was barely a year old.

Facebook didn’t exist.

The iPhone didn’t exist.

Artificial intelligence wasn’t something most Montgomery County families were discussing around the dinner table.

And an unusually accomplished collection of future Maryland political figures was worrying about something considerably more immediate:

Graduation.

Courtney Finklea Green was graduating from Springbrook High School, Class of 1999.

She would later become Maryland Deputy State Treasurer and, in 2024, was elected as a Democratic National Convention delegate from Maryland’s 5th Congressional District.

Official Maryland election results show Green receiving 73,976 votes, with the State Board of Elections marking her as one of the winning delegates. (Maryland Elections)

Across the county, Bernice Mireku—years before becoming Delegate Bernice Mireku-North—was graduating from Montgomery Blair High School, Class of 1999.

She would go on to represent Montgomery County’s District 14 in the Maryland House of Delegates.

Then there was Marc Korman.

Korman graduated from Richard Montgomery High School in Rockville in 1999.

Today, Delegate Korman represents Montgomery County’s District 16 and chairs the powerful House Environment and Transportation Committee. His official legislative biography confirms both his 1999 Richard Montgomery graduation and current chairmanship. (Maryland General Assembly)

And Korman’s graduation year produces an almost perfect piece of Montgomery County historical irony.

Because while the future chairman was graduating from high school in Rockville, Montgomery County government was publicly announcing that a company’s data-center operations would remain in Rockville.

Same city.

Same year.

Future legislator studying for finals.

Servers humming somewhere else in town.

Nobody handed Korman his diploma and said:

Congratulations, Marc. Welcome to the data-center economy.

And he wasn’t alone.

DATA CENTER FACE

Typical Case of Data Center Face. Does Brooke look “Well Preserved” because of Long-Term Data Center Exposure?

MEET MONTGOMERY COUNTY’S DATA-CENTER GENERATION

The Class of ’99 is only part of the story.

Future Maryland Comptroller Brooke Lierman grew up in Montgomery County and attended Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda.

She would eventually become Maryland’s 34th Comptroller and the first woman independently elected to one of Maryland’s constitutional offices.

Future Maryland Senator Jeff Waldstreicher grew up in this same broader Montgomery County generation and attended Montgomery Blair High School.

He would eventually represent Montgomery County’s District 18 in the Maryland Senate.

Future Montgomery County Councilmember Will Jawando grew up in the Long Branch area of Silver Spring.

He would eventually become an at-large member of the Montgomery County Council.

And here history makes an almost perfect circle:

The Montgomery County kid who grew up while data infrastructure quietly existed around the county would eventually become a leading voice in the 2026 political debate over whether Montgomery County should temporarily stop additional data-center development.

The kids grew up.

The data centers grew up too.

Apparently only one became a political controversy.

MAYBE IT WAS SOMETHING IN THE SERVERS

Children raised near Data Centers seem to age slower and on average are SMARTER , BETTER LOOKING, and MORE SUCCESSFUL.

There is, of course, another possibility Montgomery County’s data-center studies appear to have completely overlooked.

Look at this group.

They’re accomplished.

They’re educated.

They’re politically active.

And several remain remarkably youthful-looking and spry decades after roaming the halls of Montgomery County Public Schools.

Coincidence?

Almost certainly.

But perhaps before Montgomery County bans anything, somebody should investigate whether growing up around 1990s computing infrastructure was actually the County’s original gifted-and-talented program.

Maybe it wasn’t the magnets.

Maybe it was the servers.

Before an entirely ridiculous rumor escapes onto Facebook, let’s establish something clearly:

There is absolutely no scientific evidence that growing up in the general vicinity of data infrastructure makes anyone younger-looking, smarter, more energetic or more likely to become a Maryland politician.

None.

Zero.

Please do not begin relocating children next to server racks.

Still…

For a Montgomery County generation that produced a state comptroller, state legislators, committee leaders, a county councilmember, a deputy state treasurer and an elected Democratic National Convention delegate, the cohort turned out rather well.

The Class of ‘99 isn’t exactly hurting the completely unscientific theory.

But beneath the joke is a serious question:

How could an entire generation grow up in Montgomery County without data centers becoming a major public issue?

The answer explains much of today’s controversy.

THE DATA CENTERS WEREN’T SECRET

Let’s establish an important distinction.

There is no evidence Montgomery County government secretly concealed data centers from residents.

The companies knew they existed.

Government knew.

Planning officials knew.

Institutions operating computing infrastructure knew.

Most residents simply had little reason to know or care.

And Montgomery County’s own records provide the receipt.

THE RECEIPT FROM 1999

On February 5, 1999, Montgomery County announced that GE Information Services would relocate its global headquarters within Montgomery County.

The company was moving from two buildings in Rockville into approximately 341,000 square feet of office and research-and-development space in Gaithersburg.

The relocation allowed GE Information Services to consolidate its headquarters.

But then came one fascinating sentence:

“The company’s data center operations will remain in Rockville.”

There it is.

1999.

Twenty-seven years before Montgomery County’s 2026 data-center fight, County government itself was publicly acknowledging data-center operations in Rockville. (Montgomery County MD)

And Montgomery County’s April 1999 official financial statement provides additional context about just how technologically concentrated the I-270 corridor had become. It identifies GE Information Services’ move, NASD’s planned 450,000-square-foot consolidated Rockville facility, Celera Genomics’ 200,000-square-foot Rockville facility and other major technology and biotechnology investments. (Montgomery County Government)

So the question isn’t:

When did data centers arrive in Montgomery County?

A better question is:

When did Montgomery County residents start noticing them?

MONTGOMERY COUNTY HAD DATA CENTERS—JUST NOT TODAY’S KIND

Historical Montgomery County Planning research provides an important distinction.

As commercial data centers proliferated in Northern Virginia during the internet boom, Montgomery County had a different technology footprint.

Companies and institutions could maintain proprietary computing and data-center infrastructure without Montgomery County developing anything approaching Northern Virginia’s enormous commercial data-center industry.

That’s crucial.

Northern Virginia was building a data-center industry.

Montgomery County had data-center infrastructure.

A corporation could operate its own facility.

A university could maintain servers.

Government could operate computing infrastructure.

An institution could have a dedicated center supporting its own operations.

To an ordinary resident driving past, there might be nothing remarkable to see.

Montgomery County had the computers.

Virginia was building the industry.

BACK THEN, A DATA CENTER DIDN’T MEAN WHAT IT MEANS TODAY

That is the key to understanding why Montgomery County residents weren’t marching against them in 1999.

The political meaning of the words “data center” has changed.

The modern debate increasingly involves hyperscale facilities supporting cloud computing, artificial intelligence and massive quantities of digital information.

And scale changes everything.

Today’s residents reasonably want to know:

How much electricity will they consume?

Will additional transmission infrastructure be necessary?

Who pays for those improvements?

How much water could cooling require?

What about noise?

Backup generators?

Environmental effects?

Where should enormous facilities be permitted?

What happens when one is proposed near homes, schools or environmentally sensitive land?

Those aren’t questions most Montgomery County families had any reason to ask about a corporate computing operation in 1999.

WHY CITIZENS CARE NOW

So the explanation for the apparent contradiction isn’t that Montgomery County suddenly became hostile to technology.

The technology became harder to ignore.

A relatively unobtrusive proprietary facility supporting one corporation is one thing.

A hyperscale campus potentially requiring enormous electrical capacity is another.

The old data center might have been technological plumbing.

The new one can become an infrastructure decision affecting an entire community.

Visibility follows scale.

And once residents began contemplating what the next generation could mean for electricity, water, land and infrastructure, the politics changed.

Fast.

FROM THE DOT-COM ERA TO MORATORIUM

The transformation is remarkable.

At the turn of the century, data infrastructure was associated with Montgomery County’s emergence as a technology and biotechnology powerhouse.

By 2026, County officials and residents were debating whether new data-center development should temporarily stop while Montgomery County figured out what rules should govern it.

Suddenly there were debates about zoning.

Environmental effects.

Electricity.

Water.

Generators.

The Agricultural Reserve.

And whether the County’s existing laws were adequate for facilities fundamentally larger than the proprietary centers of an earlier era.

The data center had gone from background infrastructure to front-page politics.

WAIT—THEY’RE ALREADY HERE?

Then came another important realization during Montgomery County’s 2026 debate.

Planning officials identified existing data centers already operating in Montgomery County, even as officials were debating how the County should regulate the next generation.

That is perhaps the simplest way to understand this entire story:

The data centers didn’t suddenly appear.

Public awareness did.

ROCKVILLE: THE CLEAREST HISTORICAL LOCATION

There is not yet enough historical public documentation to responsibly declare that Rockville had more data centers than every other Montgomery County community during the 1990s.

A complete city-by-city historical inventory simply isn’t available in the records reviewed for this article.

But Rockville is the clearest documented early location.

We know GE Information Services maintained data-center operations there in 1999 because Montgomery County said so itself. (Montgomery County MD)

And Rockville sat at the heart of the extraordinary I-270 technology corridor.

Montgomery County’s own 1999 financial documentation describes major technology and biotechnology operations around Rockville and Gaithersburg, including GE Information Services, NASD, Celera Genomics and The Institute for Genomic Research. (Montgomery County Government)

That makes the geography of the Class of ’99 particularly interesting.

Springbrook.

Montgomery Blair.

Richard Montgomery.

Future political leaders were growing up across Montgomery County at exactly the moment the County’s technology economy was exploding.

They just weren’t calling themselves the Data-Center Generation.

GOVERNMENT KNEW. CITIZENS MOSTLY HAD NO REASON TO.

That distinction matters.

Something can be publicly disclosed without becoming part of public consciousness.

Montgomery County publicly acknowledged GE’s data-center operations.

Planning officials understood the infrastructure.

Companies maintained it.

Institutions depended on it.

But why would the average Montgomery County parent in 1999 search government documents to determine where computer servers were housed?

There was no major controversy compelling them to.

For most residents, data centers were essentially technological plumbing.

Nobody spends much time thinking about the plumbing until somebody proposes installing a pipe the size of a highway.

That is essentially what happened to the politics of data centers.

AND NOW THE DATA-CENTER GENERATION IS RUNNING THINGS

There is something wonderfully Montgomery County about the historical circle.

The young people attending Montgomery County high schools during the technology boom didn’t disappear.

They grew up and entered public life.

The Springbrook graduate became Deputy State Treasurer and an elected Democratic National Convention delegate. Maryland’s official 2024 results show Green winning her District 5 delegate position with 73,976 votes. (Maryland Elections)

The Blair graduate became a Maryland delegate.

The Richard Montgomery graduate became chairman of the House Environment and Transportation Committee. (Maryland General Assembly)

The Whitman graduate became Comptroller of Maryland.

Another Blair graduate became a state senator.

The Silver Spring kid became a Montgomery County Councilmember involved in the modern data-center debate.

Meanwhile, the technology that had been humming quietly in their childhood county evolved into infrastructure powerful enough to trigger one of Montgomery County’s most consequential modern land-use debates.

That isn’t evidence that any of these individuals personally knew—or didn’t know—where a particular data center was located.

That’s precisely the point.

There was little reason for an ordinary teenager—or most ordinary adults—to notice.

THE REAL QUESTION ISN’T WHETHER MONTGOMERY COUNTY SHOULD HAVE DATA CENTERS

That question is decades late.

Montgomery County already has them.

The more important questions are:

How many operate today?

Where exactly are they?

How large are they?

How much electricity do they consume?

How much water do they use?

How were older facilities classified under County zoning?

How should institutional or proprietary centers be distinguished from hyperscale AI facilities?

What infrastructure should developers—not residential ratepayers—be responsible for funding?

And ultimately:

How big is Montgomery County willing to let the next generation become?

Those are the questions residents deserve answered.

THEY WERE ALREADY HERE

Montgomery County didn’t discover data centers in 2026.

It discovered what data centers could become.

In 1999, GE Information Services maintained data-center operations in Rockville while a generation of future Maryland political figures was coming of age in Montgomery County. The County’s own contemporary records establish both the Rockville data-center operation and the remarkable technology expansion occurring along the I-270 corridor. (Montgomery County MD)

Courtney Finklea Green graduated from Springbrook.

Bernice Mireku-North graduated from Montgomery Blair.

Marc Korman graduated from Richard Montgomery—in Rockville itself.

Brooke Lierman, Jeff Waldstreicher, Will Jawando and thousands of others belonged to the broader Montgomery County generation growing up alongside a technology economy that was quietly transforming their home county.

Some became lawyers.

Some became legislators.

One became Comptroller.

One became Deputy State Treasurer.

One won election as a Democratic National Convention delegate with nearly 74,000 votes. (Maryland Elections)

And some would eventually find themselves debating the future of the very category of infrastructure that had existed quietly in the background of their youth.

Back then, teenagers worried about graduation.

Adults worried about the dot-com economy.

The servers hummed.

Most citizens had no particular reason to notice.

Twenty-seven years later?

Everybody is talking about them.

And that may be the central lesson of Montgomery County’s forgotten data-center history:

The data centers didn’t suddenly arrive.

They got bigger.

So did Montgomery County’s Class of ’99.

Judging by the latter, apparently pretty well.

SOURCES & DOCUMENTATION

Montgomery County Government — “GE Information Services Relocates in Montgomery County,” February 5, 1999. The County’s contemporaneous announcement states that GE Information Services was relocating its global headquarters to 341,000 square feet in Gaithersburg while its data-center operations would remain in Rockville. (Montgomery County MD)

Montgomery County, Maryland — Official Statement, April 21, 1999. The County’s financial disclosure provides contemporaneous documentation of the technology boom along the I-270 corridor, including GE Information Services, NASD, Celera Genomics and other major technology and biotechnology operations. (Montgomery County Government)

Maryland General Assembly — 2026 Roster and Committee Assignments. The official legislative biography confirms that Marc Korman was born in Montgomery County, graduated from Richard Montgomery High School in Rockville in 1999 and serves as chair of the House Environment and Transportation Committee. (Maryland General Assembly)

Maryland State Board of Elections — Official 2024 Presidential Primary Election Results, Democratic National Convention Delegates, District 5. Official results identify Courtney Finklea Green as a winning Biden delegate with 73,976 votes (11.45%). (Maryland Elections)

Additional primary-source documentation used for the broader historical article: Montgomery County Planning’s information-technology industry research; Montgomery County Council’s 2026 data-center legislation and staff reports; Montgomery County Executive data-center community materials; Maryland General Assembly member biographies; Maryland State Archives biographical records; Montgomery County Public Schools historical materials; and Montgomery History’s oral-history collection.

Editorial note: Courtney Finklea Green’s Springbrook High School Class of 1999 information is biographical information supplied for this article. Her 2024 election as a Democratic National Convention delegate is independently verified by the Maryland State Board of Elections. (Maryland Elections)

Most 2027 Maryland legislative strategies are already out of date—and pre-file season hasn’t even hit full swing.

If your government relations team is relying on the same 90-day playback from last session, you’re missing three major structural shifts happening across Annapolis right now.

With multi-billion-dollar structural deficits looming over the General Fund, severe capital constraints inside the Transportation Trust Fund (TTF), and sweeping committee realignments—including key retirements like Delegate Bonnie Cullison—the 2027 session will be won or lost before January.

Here are the 3 structural shifts every Maryland advocacy team needs to map out before November…

READ THE FULL STRATEGY BREAKDOWN]

1. The Fiscal Squeeze: From Legislative Mandates to Regulatory Defense

The era of broad, big-budget policy mandates is officially over in Annapolis. As fiscal analysts track structural budget shortfalls exceeding $1.5 billion annually, lawmakers will no longer have the appetite to fund expansive new legislative programs. Every bill carrying a General Fund price tag will face extreme friction from the Department of Legislative Services (DLS) and fiscal subcommittees.

• The GR Impact: Traditional “pass a bill to fund a problem” strategies will stall out or get killed in committee. Moreover, capital projects reliant on the Transportation Trust Fund (TTF) face immense pressure as state leaders prioritize system preservation over expansion.

• The Strategic Shift: High-performing advocacy teams are pivoting to administrative and regulatory channels. Instead of asking for new statutory mandates, focus on agency rulemaking, COMAR updates, and executive implementation of existing laws (e.g., climate compliance under the Climate Solutions Now Act, data privacy guidelines, or health agency scope-of-practice regulations). Achieving industry certainty through executive policy avoids the fiscal-note landmine entirely.

2. Pre-Session Coalition Building & The November Ballot Ripple Effect

Waiting until Opening Day to build legislative consensus is a fast track to getting held for “further study.” Critical statewide ballot measures on the November ballot—ranging from constitutional amendments to local referendums—are shifting stakeholder priorities early.

• The GR Impact: Powerhouse trade associations, labor unions, and municipal coalitions (like MACo and MML) are locking in their legislative agendas and policy pacts months earlier than usual. If your team attempts to introduce complex or controversial language without pre-session consensus, opponents will easily freeze your bill in subcommittee.

• The Strategic Shift: Late summer and early autumn must be used for proactive, pre-session stakeholder briefings. If your bill touches public-private partnerships, local tax authority, or county-level implementation, negotiate consensus language now. When legislators see a pre-filed bill backed by a pre-assembled coalition of county leaders and industry partners, the pathway through committee accelerates exponentially.

3. Committee Mechanics & The Post-Retirement Roster Realignment

Bill survival in Annapolis isn’t governed by party margins; it’s governed by committee room mechanics. As key committee rosters realign heading into the 2027 cycle—marked by notable departures like Delegate Bonnie Cullison and subsequent subcommittee realignments across the seven House standing committees—the gatekeepers are changing.

• The GR Impact: A bill that easily cleared a subcommittee two years ago may face a completely different set of priorities, line-item scrutiny, or leadership philosophy in 2027. Cross-file dynamics between Senate Finance / Budget & Taxation and House Economic Matters / Ways & Means are shifting as intermediate-tenure lawmakers assume key subcommittee leadership roles.

• The Strategic Shift: Re-map your committee intelligence. Do not rely on legacy relationships. Analyze which delegates and senators are taking on elevated roles in budget reconciliation and subcommittee drafting. Knowing who controls the voting workgroups—and what their specific district or policy drivers are—is the single most critical factor in moving a bill out of the hopper.

The Pre-Session Checklist for Advocacy Leaders

• Audit Your Fiscal Notes: Can your priority legislation survive an austere budget environment without touching the General Fund?

• Pivot to Executive & Regulatory Action: Can your policy objective be achieved through COMAR adjustments or agency guidance rather than statutory changes?

• Map Subcommittee Leadership: Have you identified and briefed the newly elevated subcommittee chairs across key standing committees?

THE DAVIS NETWORK

Maryland’s Quietest Political Machine May Be Hiding in Plain Sight

Dereck Davis has spent more than three decades surrounded by people who became powerful. From Prince George’s County to Montgomery and Howard, from elected politics to the inner workings of state government, Davis has accumulated something potentially more valuable than another title: relationships. The question now is whether he can turn those relationships into a legacy.

By The Maryland Wire

Mike Miller had Miller people.

Steny Hoyer had Hoyer people.

For decades in Maryland politics, everybody understood what those phrases meant.

They weren’t necessarily employees.

They weren’t always protégés.

Some were legislators.

Some were operatives.

Some were donors.

Some were lobbyists.

Some were government officials.

And some eventually became powerful enough that they no longer needed the politician who initially helped open a door.

Together, those relationships became something bigger.

A network.

Which raises an intriguing question about Maryland State Treasurer Dereck Davis:

Read more

An Early Look at the 2030 Democratic Primary for Maryland Comptroller

If incumbent Comptroller Brooke Lierman launches a bid for governor in 2030, the race for Maryland’s chief financial officer will transform into a wide-open, highly competitive statewide contest. Without an incumbent on the ballot, the nomination is set to attract a blend of executive administrators, key legislative leaders, and statewide organizers.

The Potential Contenders

Courtney Finklea Green (Deputy State Treasurer):

Green is establishing early momentum through aggressive fundraising execution. Demonstrating the ability to leverage state administrative experience alongside a broad financial network, she recently made a splash during a statewide fundraising initiative for Governor Wes Moore. Challenged to raise $50,000 at a event in Potomac, Green surpassed expectations by bringing in over $70,000. Her donor base spanned beyond the immediate suburbs to include contributors from Baltimore City, Baltimore County, Harford County, Cecil County, and the Eastern Shore—demonstrating statewide reach that answered early questions about her financial viability. Beyond fundraising, supporters point to her administrative track record: after taking the helm at Maryland 529 during a period of agency crisis, she stabilized operations, resolved systemic performance issues, and elevated the college savings plan to top national ratings for both customer service and return on investment within three years.

Senator Brian Feldman (Montgomery County):

Bringing fiscal credentials as Chair of the Senate Education, Energy, and the Environment Committee, Feldman commands a base in populous Montgomery County. However, observers note significant structural headwinds to a potential run. As a practicing CPA and attorney with a Washington-area law firm, stepping into the full-time executive role of Comptroller would require a substantial reduction in personal income. Additionally, while highly regarded for his legislative effectiveness in Annapolis, Feldman currently lacks broad name recognition outside of his home county.

Brian has a history of considering running for comptroller. His first bout was 2010 where he considered and then elected not to run. That would have been against Peter Franchot. Then again he was looking at running for comptroller in 2014 when it was expected that Peter would run for governor. About 2012, Peter announced that he was not going to run for governor And everyone who had announced that they were going to run for Comptroller backed out except for Brian who stayed in the race until late and then withdrew. He skipped announcing that he was going to run in 2018 and announced that he was going to run a 2022. Then Brooke Lierman came on strong and he decided not to run. Consequently, insiders are telling me he's not a viable candidate for 2030.

County Executive Jessica Fitzwater (Frederick County):

Fitzwater offers an executive background outside the immediate Washington-Baltimore core. However, her electoral path presents arithmetic and political challenges in a Democratic primary. Frederick County remains a purple jurisdiction where Democrats hold only a slim edge over Republicans amidst a large unaffiliated voting bloc, giving it a much smaller Democratic primary vote share compared to suburban giants like Howard, Montgomery, or Prince George’s counties. Furthermore, Fitzwater’s narrow 500-vote victory in her executive race highlighted limited baseline vote margins, and recent local political friction—particularly surrounding data center developments—has generated pushback among segments of her local Democratic base.

Senator Guy Guzzone (Howard County):

As Chair of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee, Guzzone stands as one of the most influential fiscal policy voices in the General Assembly. While transition from legislative leadership to executive office requires building operational infrastructure, the administrative authority of the Comptroller’s office remains an enticing target. Guzzone’s prospective candidacy faces two primary hurdles: Howard County’s relatively small Democratic registration base compared to neighboring jurisdictions, and internal legislative dynamics. With Senate leadership potentially shifting in future cycles, Guzzone is widely viewed as a premier candidate for Senate President should current leadership step aside, presenting a strategic choice between executive ambition and internal legislative power.

Evaluating the Primary Field

While the election cycle remains several years away, early dynamics suggest two primary factors will dictate success in an open primary:

• Operational & Financial Readiness: Candidates who establish early fundraising capability force potential rivals to assess their viability well before formal filing deadlines.

• Geographic & Demographic Coalitions: High-density jurisdictions—specifically Prince George’s, Montgomery, and Baltimore counties—control significant blocks of the statewide primary electorate. Candidates capable of building cross-regional coalitions out of these core population centers will hold a structural advantage entering the race.

APPOINTMENTS: Pipeline Upgrade inside the State House

By Barry O’Connell

The Governor’s Office of Appointments recently welcomed two new key additions to its placement operations: Sydney Paschall as Senior Placement Specialist and Cameron Barros as Placement Specialist.

For the general public, internal staffing changes in the State House rarely cause a blip on the radar. But for political insiders, board applicants, and Annapolis advocates, knowing who manages the pipeline to Maryland’s 600+ boards and commissions is essential intelligence.

(Paywall Break — Full Article Below for Paid Subscribers)

To Sydney and Cameron: welcome aboard!

First off, let’s establish the ground rules. You are stepping in to serve a leader who many observers across the Free State consider the finest Governor to walk the halls of the State House since Oden Bowie took office in 1869.

Now, out of respect, I am intentionally not commenting on the fact that you report directly to Appointments Secretary Mollie Byron. I am explicitly refraining from publicly noting that Molly remains one of the single most effective, capable, and indispensable professionals operating in Maryland state government today. Why? Because if I were to say those things out loud, people might repeat them to her, which would embarrass her.

So, strictly adhering to protocol: Governor Moore is wonderful, and we shall leave it entirely at that.

Inside baseball aside, these hires come at a critical operational window. Late summer and early fall represent the peak crunch time for the Appointments Office. Managing vacancies across more than 600 gubernatorial boards and commissions requires constant administrative output, rigorous vetting, and seamless coordination with the legislative branch. To clear that workload, top-tier talent isn’t just nice to have—it is an operational requirement.

Looking at their respective track records, the office secured strong reinforcements:

• 

  Sydney Paschall (Senior Placement Specialist): Sydney arrives directly from the Maryland General Assembly’s Senate Executive Nominations Committee. For anyone who tracks the confirmation process in Annapolis, her background needs little introduction. Having managed appointee communications, legislative records, and executive nomination workflows on the Senate side, she brings an intimate understanding of what passes muster when names move before the committee.

• 

  Cameron Barros (Placement Specialist): Cameron comes out of high-volume political and field operations with the Wes Moore for Maryland campaign, bringing hands-on experience in data analysis, executive briefings, and stakeholder engagement.

By pairing direct Senate confirmation experience with high-capacity field operations, the Appointments Office is strengthening both ends of the pipeline—vetting and confirmation—just as the autumn crunch hits its stride.

Welcome to the team, Sydney and Cameron. We look forward to tracking your work!

Further Reading:

The State Circle Blindspot: Why Maryland’s Immigrant Business Coalitions Don’t Always Use Traditional Lobbyists

By Barry O'Connell

Walk down Main Street in Annapolis or through the hallways of the Lowe House Office Building during a legislative session, and you’ll see the standard apparatus of Maryland influence: retainer-based government relations firms, State Circle lawyers, and registered PAC directors all vying for access to committee chairs and agency secretaries.

Yet across Maryland’s most highly regulated, cash-intensive retail sectors—from Korean liquor store operators in Baltimore City and Nepali business owners in Baltimore County to Chinese commercial interests in Montgomery County and Greek merchants statewide—a completely different political infrastructure exists.

These hard-working business owners don't hire high-priced Annapolis lobby shops or file elaborate disclosures. Yet when state leadership needs to raise major campaign capital or gauge community buy-in on regulatory shifts, these immigrant business networks mobilize with a speed that leaves traditional State Circle firms flat-footed.

The secret isn't a secret society or a shadow organization. It is trust, culture, and an essential human bridge that political insiders consistently overlook: Clemis "Clem" Kaikis.

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August lobbying in Annapolis

The evolution of political lobbying in Annapolis isn't marked by sprawling office suites or massive oak desks anchored down by landline consoles and bulging Rolodexes. On a warm Wednesday afternoon, it looks like Talmadge Branch standing on an Annapolis sidewalk, managing a full slate of business from the palm of his hand.

The modern legislative landscape moves fast, and staying ahead requires a mix of institutional wisdom and modern agility. Firms like Capitol Strategies highlight that shift—combining seasoned veterans with rising talent. While founding principal Sushant Sidh set a strong foundation, the firm continues to build momentum with a dynamic range of experience: senior statesmen like Branch working alongside sharp, next-generation government relations professionals like Josie Friedl.

The summer months in state politics carry a distinct rhythm. With special sessions wrapped and the regular session months away, the work shifts from committee rooms to relationship-building—keeping touchpoints active with current clients while engaging prospective ones. Yet behind the strategy and policy discussions, the work remains deeply personal.

Speaking with Branch turns into a wide-ranging conversation about family, resilience, and the human side of public service. He spoke candidly about the heavy weight of personal loss—specifically the tragic loss of his grandson to violence, and the acute pain of watching his daughter, Delegate Chanel Branch, navigate that same grief.

Chanel Branch’s return to the Maryland General Assembly brings both seasoned familiarity and a personal mission. Having already navigated the learning curve of the Capitol, she steps back into office with a clear focus on the issues that hit closest to home: gun violence prevention, crime reduction, and expanding cancer awareness and healthcare access—drawing from her own strength as a breast cancer survivor.

Throughout his time in office since his election in 1994, Branch witnessed key shifts in State House leadership, pointing to figures like State Treasurer Dereck E. Davis as examples of steady, effective leadership in Maryland governance.

Navigating this changing landscape also means keeping tabs on top-tier practitioners across the state—from land-use experts and advocacy leaders like Tom Coale at Perry Jacobson in Annapolis and Howard County, to the dedicated teams reshaping client representation on the ground. Today's lobbying dynamic isn't tethered to a desk; it's mobile, personal, and continuously evolving.

Also see

The Francis Scott Key Bridge wasn’t just a transportation artery—it was a sudden, brutal stress test for how government works under extreme pressure.

For the general public, it is a masterclass in executive leadership, crisis management, and the raw political mechanics of funding major infrastructure. But for the insiders—the government relations professionals, lobbyists, and policy strategists—the real story lies beneath the surface: in the complex mechanics of progressive design-build contracting, federal subrogation, and interagency regulatory bypasses.

Here is how both sides of that story come together.

The Anatomy of a Crisis: Leadership, Logistics, and the Key Bridge Rebuild

When the M/V Dali struck the Francis Scott Key Bridge, it severed more than just Interstate 695. It pinched off one of the East Coast’s most critical maritime corridors and tested the operational capacity of state and federal government overnight.

The Executive Test: Leadership Under Fire

In modern politics, executive leadership is rarely judged on steady-state governance; it is measured in hours following a crisis.

For Governor Wes Moore, the Key Bridge collapse transformed a political honeymoon into a trial by fire. The immediate response required balancing acute tragedy with cold economic reality: six workers lost their lives, the Port of Baltimore stood completely blocked, and supply chains across the Mid-Atlantic began backing up into local communities.

The administration’s playbook leaned heavily into operational transparency and unified command. By coordinating federal agencies, local first responders, and maritime authorities in the initial hours, the state established a cadence of execution that defined the response. Removing 50,000 tons of steel and concrete to reopen the Fort McHenry Channel in 11 weeks wasn't just an engineering feat—it was a political imperative to prevent lasting economic damage to the region.

┌───────────────────────────────────────────────────┐

│ CRISIS RESPONSE TIMELINE │

├────────────────────────────────────────────────────┤

│ March 26: Impact & Immediate Channel Closure │

│ June 10: Full Restoration of Fort McHenry Channel │

│ July: Categorical Exclusion NEPA Approval Granted │

│ August: MDTA Awards $73M Phase 1 Progressive Contract │

└───────────────────────────────────────────────────┘

The Federal Funding Fight

While the physical clearing moved at record speed, the legislative heavy lifting shifted to Capitol Hill. President Biden’s early commitment to cover 100% of the rebuild costs via federal funds immediately ran into the reality of a divided Congress.

Team Maryland—led by the state’s congressional delegation—had to construct a bipartisan coalition to navigate fiscal conservative pushback. The core argument rested on precedent and national impact: the Port of Baltimore is a federal trade node, and emergency relief funds (via the Federal Highway Administration’s Emergency Relief program) had historically stepped in for major infrastructure disasters. Securing federal backing through the Baltimore BRIDGE Relief Act required delicate political trade-offs, proving that keeping the delegation united was just as vital as the engineering plans.

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Upgrade your subscription to access our policy mechanics deep dive: an analysis of MDTA’s progressive design-build contracting, the legal subrogation framework for federal cost-recovery, and how interagency permitting fast-tracks bypassed multi-year NEPA delays.

Procurement Strategy: The Shift to Progressive Design-Build

For government relations professionals and industry contractors, the most notable aspect of the Key Bridge rebuild is how the Maryland Transportation Authority (MDTA) structured its procurement. Traditional Design-Bid-Build models—where state agencies fully design a project before accepting construction bids—would have added years to the timeline.

Instead, MDTA opted for a Progressive Design-Build (PDB) model.

TRADITIONAL DESIGN-BID-BUILD

[ Full Design Phase ] ──► [ Open Bidding ] ──► [ Construction ]

(High friction, lengthy timeline, rigid cost adjustments)

PROGRESSIVE DESIGN-BUILD (PDB)

[ Integrated Owner + Contractor Team ]

├── Phase 1: Scope, Risk Assessment & Early Design ($73M)

└── Phase 2: Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) & Full Build

(Compressed schedule, early risk-sharing, flexible scope)

By awarding a initial $73 million Phase 1 contract to Kiewit Infrastructure Co., MDTA brought the builder onto the engineering team immediately.

* Early Collaboration: Rather than litigating scope changes later, Kiewit and MDTA collaborated on risk assessment, material sourcing, and foundation designs before finalizing total costs.

* Off-Ramp Options: Phase 1 gave Kiewit exclusive negotiating rights for Phase 2 (final design and construction) under a Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP). If the state and contractor cannot agree on the final price, MDTA retains the right to take the fully developed design out to a separate bid mechanism.

Legal Mechanics: Subrogation, Insurance, and Recovery

How the federal government and the State of Maryland recover costs from private parties establishes a critical legal blueprint for future maritime infrastructure claims.

| Funding & Recovery Source | Amount | Institutional Mechanism & Status |

|---|---|---|

| State Property Insurance | $350 Million | Direct payout received by Maryland from insurer Chubb to cover initial property damage. |

| DOJ Civil Settlement | $101.98 Million | Resolved federal claims against Grace Ocean & Synergy Marine under the Oil Pollution Act and Rivers/Harbors Act to cover channel cleanup. |

| FHWA Emergency Relief | 80% - 100% initial | Federal Highway Administration emergency funds backing initial construction outlays. |

| State Litigation Claims | TBD | Ongoing claims filed by the State of Maryland against the vessel owner/operator. |

The structural takeaway for GR professionals is the subrogation pipeline. Under federal emergency relief statutes, any dollars recovered by the state through third-party lawsuits or insurance claims must ultimately be remitted back to the Federal Highway Administration to offset initial federal outlays. The quick $102 million DOJ settlement cleared the federal government’s channel response costs without entangling the state’s separate litigation for the actual bridge structure.

Regulatory Fast-Tracking: Environmental Categorical Exclusions

A key point of interest for infrastructure developers is how MDOT and the Federal Highway Administration navigated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) without triggering multi-year delays or environmental lawsuits.

In July 2024, FHWA granted a formal Categorical Exclusion (CE) for the rebuild project. The regulatory logic was straightforward: because the replacement span is being constructed within the former bridge’s existing right-of-way and maintains the same four-lane capacity, the agency determined it had no significant incremental impact on surrounding natural or cultural resources.

By establishing that replacing destroyed infrastructure within an established footprint does not require a fresh Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), MDOT shaved an estimated 18 to 24 months off pre-construction prep—providing a clear framework for future rapid-replacement projects across the country.

The Trouble with ADUs: How Building Codes Are Killing Maryland’s Backyard Housing Boom—and the $500M Corporate Model That Could Save It

By Barry O’Connell

If you listen to the policy architects in Annapolis, you’d think Maryland had just unlocked the golden ticket to solving its housing crisis.

With the passage of the landmark Accessory Dwelling Units Act (HB 1466 / SB 891), the General Assembly mandated that every charter county and municipality adopt local laws authorizing backyard cottages, in-law suites, and dinky side-yard bungalows by October 1, 2026.

The vision is simple and politically lucrative: allow suburban homeowners to build 400-to-600-square-foot cottages, create an ocean of naturally occurring affordable rental housing for seniors and young workers, and give middle-class property owners a crack at passive rental income.

It sounds brilliant on a press release. But if you talk to the land-use attorneys, land developers, and civil engineers tasked with actually building these things, you discover a dirty secret:

Under Maryland’s current regulatory and building code environment, the individual homeowner ADU model is dead on arrival.

The problem isn't a lack of interest. The problem is a massive, structural collision between well-intentioned housing policy and an unyielding wall of building code inflation.

The $150,000 "Dinky House" Paradox

My father once bought a small backyard bungalow—what they used to call a pool cabana. It was a single-room, ground-level timber frame structure. It was simple, affordable, and functional.

Try doing that today in Howard, Anne Arundel, or Prince George’s County.

Before a homeowner can drop a prefabricated $60,000 cottage onto a backyard pad, the regulatory apparatus steps in:

1. Civil Engineering & Site Prep: Site plans, stormwater management, and zoning reviews regularly drag on for six months and cost $15,000 to $25,000 in professional fees alone.

2. Environmental Health Overreach: County health departments frequently treat a single-occupancy 400-square-foot studio like a brand-new five-bedroom home, demanding massive primary septic retrofits or a 10,000-square-foot septic reserve field.

3. The Universal Fire Sprinkler Mandate: Under Maryland’s implementation of the International Residential Code (IRC) and local fire marshal mandates, every detached single-family structure—even a ground-floor studio with two immediate exterior exits—requires an NFPA 13D residential fire sprinkler system. For a backyard unit, this often means digging up the lawn, tapping water mains, or installing $15,000 holding tanks and booster pumps.

When $20,000 in engineering and $30,000 in utility upgrades are stacked onto a $60,000 factory-built cabin, a "cheap" backyard rental becomes a $150,000 to $180,000 capital asset.

At an 8% interest rate on a home equity loan, no rational homeowner is going to take on a $1,300/month debt service to rent a studio out for $1,200. The math fails. The yield evaporates.

Which raises the billion-dollar question for Maryland’s real estate industry: If mom-and-pop homeowners can't afford to build ADUs, who will? And can this broken market be packaged, scaled, and monetized at corporate volume?

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To understand how to monetize the ADU revolution in Maryland, you have to stop thinking like a residential remodeling contractor and start thinking like a utility-scale solar developer.

For years, the rooftop solar industry faced the exact same bottleneck: high upfront capital costs ($25,000+), complex permitting, and hesitant homeowners who didn't want to take out loans for technology they didn't fully understand.

Solar solved this through the Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) / Solar Lease model: We put the panels on your roof for zero dollars down, we absorb the permitting and installation risk, we maintain the asset, and we split the economic value with you over 20 years.

The exact same playbook can—and will—be applied to Maryland’s backyard housing market.

The "Distributed Residential Yield" (DRY) Model: Scaling 500 Backyard Homes

Imagine a private equity fund or regional real estate developer approaching a homeowner in Howard County or Prince George's County with a simple proposition:

"We will build a high-end, $120,000 eco-cottage in your backyard. Zero dollars out of your pocket. We handle the civil engineering, the fire suppression work, the county permitting, and the construction. In exchange, we sign a 20-year backyard land lease. We manage the tenant, pay you $400/month in pure ground-lease cash flow, and collect the remaining rent to amortize our capital and secure an institutional yield."

This is the Distributed Residential Yield (DRY) model, or "Backyard-as-a-Service." Here is why this model solves the very structural problems strangling individual homeowners:

1. Economy of Scale Overcomes "Soft Cost" Inflation

Where an individual homeowner gets slaughtered paying a civil engineering firm $20,000 for a one-off site design, a developer building 100 units across a single county can negotiate standardized, blanket engineering packages. They buy prefabricated, factory-certified modular units in bulk, driving unit costs down by 30% to 40%.

2. Specialized Permitting & Legal SWAT Teams

A single homeowner will get bogged down for nine months arguing with a county health officer over a septic reserve area. A specialized developer backed by high powered land-use attorneys (the Tom Coales of the world) operates with dedicated legal and entitlement pipelines. They know precisely which variance to file, which administrative exemptions apply, and how to push bulk permits through local planning boards.

3. The Institutional Capital Advantage

While a homeowner is constrained by high-interest retail HELOCs, a regional developer pools capital from private debt funds, REITs, or state affordable housing subsidies (such as DHCD financing programs). They deploy capital at institutional rates, making a $120,000 total unit deployment wildly profitable across a 500-unit portfolio.

The Legal & Financial Structure: How the Deal Works

For land-use attorneys and real estate firms, structuring a multi-unit "Backyard Portfolio" requires three core legal instruments:

+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
|                       PROPERTY OWNER                            |
|             (Owns Single-Family Detached Lot)                   |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
                                |
                                | 20-Year Backyard Ground Lease
                                v
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
|                    DEVELOPER / SPE (ENTITY)                     |
|  - Installs Prefab ADU     - Manages Tenant & Leasing           |
|  - Absorbs Utility Costs   - Splits Cash Flow / Pays Land Rent  |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
                                |
                                | Encumbers ADU Asset Only
                                v
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+
|                       INSTITUTIONAL LENDER                      |
|             (Provides Capital for Bulk Deployment)              |
+-----------------------------------------------------------------+

1. The Backyard Ground Lease: Encumbers a designated 800-square-foot portion of the residential lot without subdividing the property. It grants the developer egress rights, utility easements, and operational control of the ADU footprint for 15 to 25 years.

2. Subordinated Utility Easements: Allows the developer to trench water, sewer, and electrical lines from the main street connection or primary home meters, utilizing sub-meters to track usage independently.

3. The Option to Purchase / Buyout Clause: Gives the homeowner the right to purchase the cottage at fair market value after Year 7 or 10, or automatically assumes ownership of the structure at the expiration of the 20-year lease term.

The Three Legislative Tweaks Needed to Unlock $500M

If Secretary Jake Day, the Department of Housing and Community Development, and the General Assembly want this developer-driven model to actually deliver the thousands of affordable units they promised, they must fix three specific statutory glitches before the October 2026 deadline:

• Fix #1: Fire Sprinkler Proportionality (Sub-500 sq ft Exemption): Amend state building codes to exempt ground-level, single-story ADUs under 500 square feet from full NFPA 13D sprinkler requirements if the unit features two direct-to-grade exterior egress doors (e.g., standard French or sliding glass patio doors). Egress speed on a ground floor renders heavy suppression infrastructure redundant.

• Fix #2: Statewide Pre-Approved Plan Catalogs: Mandate that DHCD publish a state master catalog of pre-approved modular ADU architectural designs. If a developer or homeowner uses a catalog design, county plan-review timelines must be capped by law at 30 days, and plan-review fees reduced by 75%.

• Fix #3: Bedroom-Based Septic Scaling: Force local environmental health departments to calculate septic capacity strictly based on bedroom count and fixture flow rates rather than treating a studio ADU like an additional single-family home requiring 10,000 sq ft of dedicated reserve dirt.

The Bottom Line

The Maryland General Assembly passed the ADU law expecting millions of dollars in private homeowner capital to magically build affordable housing. It won't happen. Homeowners aren't real estate developers, and building codes are too complex.

The future of Maryland’s backyard housing boom belongs to the developers, attorneys, and institutional investors who realize that 500 small houses scattered across 500 suburban backyards isn't a zoning curiosity—it's a high-yield, distributed residential asset class.

The only question is which development group is going to build the first 100-unit portfolio in Howard County.

For more background on real estate development and housing policy discussions in Maryland, check out this podcast episode with attorney Tom Coale:

Aaron Dante and Tom Coale discuss housing in Maryland

This video features land-use attorney and housing lobbyist Tom Coale discussing housing growth strategy, land-use barriers, and legislative approaches to expanding housing supply across Maryland.

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See also:

Author’s Note

A quick note before we dive in: It is a rare occasion when Len Foxwell and I find ourselves on opposite sides of a policy debate. Usually, he’s the sounding board who helps me sharpen my own conclusions. On the question of expanding alcohol sales to Maryland supermarkets, however, our priorities diverge. Len rightly highlights the real-world impact of bad-neighbor retailers on vulnerable communities; I’m looking at how smart licensing reform could incentivize grocers to invest in underserved food deserts. We both agree the status quo needs work—and we both agree that while broad supermarket expansion in Maryland is ultimately inevitable, it is by no means imminent. We simply differ on how the General Assembly should bridge the gap.

The Illusion of the “Grocery Store Year”: Why Maryland’s Alcohol Fortress Is Changing, Not Collapsing

By Barry O’Connell

Every legislative cycle, mainstream news outlets run the predictable story: This is finally the year beer and wine enter Maryland grocery stores.

To the casual observer, the argument seems logical. The old guard that built and fortified Maryland’s strict three-tier alcohol distribution network for half a century has faded. The historic “Mike and Mike” era—defined by the ironclad house dominance of Speaker Michael E. Busch and the long-serving Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr.—is gone. Key lieutenants who maintained the legislative firewall, including former House Economic Matters Chair Dereck Davis (now State Treasurer) and his successor C.T. Wilson, have transitioned out of those legislative roles.

With new legislative leadership taking root, media pundits assume the defensive perimeter around independent package stores has dissolved. But those who measure power in State House committee rooms know better. The fortress hasn’t fallen; its command structure has simply evolved.

The Human Defense: Immigrant Ownership and the Realities of Main Street

The traditional argument for deregulation frames independent liquor license holders as an outdated monopoly resisting consumer convenience. That narrative ignores the modern demographic reality of Maryland’s retail alcohol industry.

Across the state—and particularly in Prince George’s and Montgomery counties—the independent package store ecosystem is heavily anchored by immigrant small-business owners. For these entrepreneurs, a county liquor license represents a massive capital investment, often secured through life savings, personal debt, and multi-generational family labor.

This dynamic hits home directly within top legislative leadership. Speaker Joseline Peña-Melnyk (JPM), who immigrated to the United States from the Dominican Republic as a child, brings a sharp perspective on working-class immigrant enterprise. While local bodies like the Prince George’s County Council push punitive municipal fees on small retailers, JPM’s caucus views these small-business owners through a lens of economic protection rather than hostility.

Further insulating the retail sector is Delegate Kriselda Valderrama, Chair of the House Economic Matters Committee. Valderrama, a powerhouse Prince George’s legislator and daughter of former Delegate David Valderrama (the first Filipino-American elected to a mainland state legislature), represents both the new face of legislative authority and a bridge to institutional memory. While her elevation reflects Maryland’s shifting leadership demographics, her deep roots in county political history mean she understands the human cost of sudden market disruption on local license holders.

When multi-state grocery chains lobby for deregulation, they aren’t just taking on distribution lobbyists like Bruce Bereano or traditional Annapolis firms; they are asking an immigrant-led House leadership team to dismantle the livelihoods of immigrant family enterprises in favor of out-of-state corporate cartels.

The Problem of the “Bad Neighbor” vs. Decent Livelihoods

This is where my conversations with Len Foxwell get particularly interesting. Len looks at the lower end of the retail package store market—especially in places like Prince George’s County—and sees retailers that have become genuine community blights.

These are the locations operating behind bulletproof glass and wire counters, willing to skirt the law by selling single loose cigarettes or breaking apart six-packs to sell individual beers. That operational model caters to a low-income customer base in a way that many neighborhood advocates feel breeds vagrancy, public intoxication, and local crime. Len argues that if the state ever opens the door to supermarket sales, it must come with strict conditions—such as mandatory dedicated Maryland craft beer and wine sections—and a deliberate effort by Senate and House leadership to phase out or eliminate these bad-actor locations.

I don’t dismiss Len’s concerns; I’ve seen those same storefront blights. But I also look at the human equation. Even in a store that struggles with community relations, the family running it is often using those margins to pay a mortgage, buy health insurance, and send their kids to college. Before state policy pulls the plug on otherwise decent, hardworking Marylanders who built a business under the rules they were given, we need to approach reform with a far higher degree of sensitivity.

The Trone Factor: How Campaign Fallout Poisoned the Big-Box Argument

If the small-business defense provides the moral barrier to grocery store sales, the political fallout surrounding Total Wine & More founder David Trone provides the personal one.

For years, proponents of expanding retail alcohol sales pointed to Total Wine’s superstore model as the future of consumer choice. However, Trone’s political maneuvers over recent election cycles created deep, lasting friction across the Maryland Democratic establishment. His hard-fought primary battles against party-backed candidates—most notably U.S. Senator Angela Alsobrooks—strained relationships with state and federal leadership.

More damaging within Annapolis political circles was the revelation regarding dark-money campaign expenditures during the 2022 Democratic primary for Attorney General, when funds were routed to target former Maryland First Lady Katie Curran O’Malley.

As a result, any legislative push that drops the multi-store restriction without strict statutory guardrails is instantly linked to Trone. In a General Assembly where personal relationships and political loyalty remain currency, handing a major policy victory to a billionaire political rival who spent millions attempting to defeat party leadership is an absolute non-starter.

The Innovation Opportunity: Licensing as an Engine for Food Deserts

So where does that leave us? If a blanket free-market blowout isn’t happening, can we use alcohol licensing for meaningful social engineering?

I believe the answer lies in leveraging the fundamental economics of retail food and beverage:

• Groceries are notoriously low-margin, high-volume operations.

• Beer and wine are high-margin, predictable-yield items.

In many urban and rural Maryland neighborhoods—areas classified as food deserts—it is economically unfeasible for a national or regional grocery chain (whether Giant, Safeway, ShopRite, or Kroger) to open a full-service supermarket. The low-margin grocery sales alone cannot justify the real estate and operational risk, leaving those communities stranded with dollar stores and corner convenience marts.

What if the General Assembly created a brand-new, highly targeted class of license?

Instead of opening the floodgates statewide, Maryland could issue specialized beer and wine licenses exclusively to full-service grocers willing to build and operate in designated food deserts. To qualify, a store couldn’t just throw a single refrigerated cooler of milk and cheese next to a wall of beer. It would be required by law to devote at least 50% to 60% of its floor space to a complete range of fresh food: fresh produce, raw meats, dairy, eggs, and dry staples.

By allowing a grocer to pair high-markup alcohol sales with low-markup essential foods under one roof, the state instantly alters the math for developers. Locations that were previously non-viable suddenly become sustainable commercial anchors.

Finding the Middle Ground in Annapolis

Len Foxwell and I agree that the status quo is far from ideal, and we agree that change won’t happen overnight. But rather than waiting for an all-or-nothing political showdown that pits big-box grocers against neighborhood package stores, Maryland has an opportunity to lead with smart, incremental reform.

By maintaining traditional package store protections in established markets while using targeted beer-and-wine licenses to attract full-service grocers to underserved communities, the General Assembly can protect immigrant small-business equity, eliminate food deserts, and give Marylanders the modern retail choices they deserve.

The fortress doesn’t need to be demolished—it just needs to open the right doors.

The Maryland Wire is often published without a paywall to ensure open access to vital state policy debates impacting our communities.

13.19% SOUNDS IMPRESSIVE. BUT WHY IS SRA CELEBRATING THREE BASIS POINTS?

Maryland’s pension fund had a strong year. But SRA’s own numbers show benchmark outperformance falling from 59 basis points to just 3 in three fiscal years — and the headline return does not mean individual pensions increased 13.19%.

On August 18, the Maryland State Retirement and Pension System released what sounds, at first glance, like extraordinary news.

The Board of Trustees, chaired by Maryland State Treasurer Dereck E. Davis, announced that Maryland’s pension investment fund generated a 13.19% net investment return for fiscal year 2026.

The fund now stands at approximately $82.1 billion.

But there is something unusual about the announcement itself.

SRA’s headline reads:

“Maryland State Retirement and Pension System exceeds benchmark with 13.16% return in fiscal year 2026.”

Yet SRA’s own release says the actual return was 13.19%.

The 13.16% figure appears instead to correspond to the policy benchmark: SRA says the 13.19% actual return outperformed that benchmark by only three basis points.

That distinction is not trivial.

Because once the numbers underneath the headline are examined, a different story emerges.

13.19% actual return.

Approximately 13.16% policy benchmark.

Three basis points of outperformance.

And that raises a simple question:

WHY IS THREE BASIS POINTS THE BASIS FOR AN “EXCEEDS BENCHMARK” HEADLINE?

To be clear, a 13.19% investment return is good news.

Investment performance matters enormously to the financial health of a pension system responsible for the retirement security of hundreds of thousands of Marylanders.

But if the story being emphasized is that Maryland “exceeded benchmark,” then Marylanders deserve to know by how much.

This year, the answer is:

Three basis points.

And three years of SRA’s own performance announcements make that number considerably more interesting.

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An Open Letter to Senator Alsobrooks: Hold the Line on the CLARITY Act

By Barry O’Connell

The eyes of Maryland—and the nation—are on you, Senator Alsobrooks.

When you and Senator Gallego voted the CLARITY Act out of the Senate Banking Committee, you made it clear that your “yes” was not a blank check. It was a vote for continued negotiation, contingent on a firm, non-negotiable principle: Marylanders do not tolerate a double standard for financial transparency or public corruption. Alongside Senator Gillibrand, you drew a line in the sand, stating that enforceable ethics provisions and robust anti-money laundering (AML) controls are absolute prerequisites for your vote on the Senate floor.

Now, the legislative rubber meets the road. Recent disclosures and deep structural flaws within the current bill have turned your prerequisites into a defining test of legislative oversight.

To protect consumers, safeguard community banking, and preserve the integrity of public service, you must hold that line and vote NO on final passage unless three critical loopholes are permanently sealed.

1. Close the “Superhighway for Corruption”

The Office of Government Ethics recently released President Trump’s annual financial disclosure, revealing an astonishing $1.4 billion in crypto-related income for 2025 alone. This includes over $635 million from$TRUMP meme coin sales and more than $500 million from World Liberty Financial token sales.

Crypto is now the single largest source of the president’s personal income. As former White House ethics counsel Richard Painter rightly noted, this creates an unprecedented, clear conflict of interest. The executive branch is actively rewriting the rules for an asset class in which the commander-in-chief holds an immense personal stake.

Yet, the White House has opposed any ethics language touching these holdings, and an amendment by Maryland’s own Senator Van Hollen to block officials from profiting off crypto policy failed in committee. Without enforceable guardrails, the CLARITY Act opens a “superhighway for corruption,” allowing public officials to trade on non-public information and enabling foreign adversaries to purchase leverage via official-affiliated tokens.

The Mandate: No policymaker should profit from the legislation they write. You have the public justification to insist on strict, enforceable ethics restrictions before this bill hits the floor.

2. End the “Illicit Finance-Friendly” AML Standards

The Bank Policy Institute has flatly warned that the current Senate text is “illicit finance-friendly”. While traditional banks operating in Baltimore and Prince George’s County are bound by rigorous Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) standards, the crypto industry is being offered an online pass. Consumers lost a reported $9.3 billion to crypto financial crime in 2024—a figure that grossly undercounts the true scale of endemic fraud and digital hacks.

As drafted, the CLARITY Act:

• Leaves Decentralized Finance (DeFi) platforms and unhosted wallets completely exempt from standard compliance.

• Fails to give FinCEN clear authority to regulate and sanction token mixers and tumblers used by bad actors to wash illicit funds.

• Creates an obvious workaround for bad actors by exempting offshore custodians.

• Applies a light-touch, tiered standard to digital asset brokers rather than uniform banking accountability.

Weak standards invite sanctions evasion, terrorist financing, and human trafficking. The crypto sector must meet the same exact anti-money laundering standards as traditional financial institutions.

3. Fix the “Yield Loophole” to Protect Maryland’s Community Banks

Beyond ethics and crime, the current text poses a structural threat to Main Street Maryland. While stablecoins are ostensibly built as payment instruments, crypto firms are aggressively exploiting a legal loophole—partnering with third-party platforms to pay interest and structural rewards to depositors.

If this “yield loophole” isn’t closed, capital will flee local financial institutions for high-yield crypto platforms. Small community banks—the lifeblood of funding for rural towns and urban neighborhoods alike—will face a projected $110 billion contraction in local lending nationwide.

When community banks lose local liquidity, they must pivot to more expensive funding sources. Those costs get passed directly to Maryland families trying to finance a home and small businesses looking to expand. Furthermore, this deposit flight completely undermines the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), starving low- and moderate-income households of the reinvestment capital they legally depend on.

Hold the Line, Senator

Senator Alsobrooks, your constituents trusted you to bring rigorous, pragmatic leadership to Washington. The Trump financial disclosure has stripped away any ambiguity or hypothetical debate regarding these risks.

Bipartisan negotiations have failed to yield adequate protections for our local banks and everyday consumers. Stand firm with your principles. Tell the leadership that without comprehensive ethics rules, full BSA/AML coverage for DeFi and mixers, and a closed yield loophole, the CLARITY Act does not deserve your vote.