With two precincts, absentees and provisionals left, Marc Elrich leads David Blair by 375. In a county of over 1 million. Wow!
Monthly Archives: June 2018
MoCo State Leg Update: Delegates Morales and Robinson Trailing Narrowly in Tight Races
State Senate
In District 18, Del. Jeff Waldstreicher looks set to win the Democratic nomination with 50% to 38% for Dana Beyer and 12% for Michelle Carhart.
House of Delegates
Incumbents Kathleen Dumais and David Fraser-Hidalgo look set to be joined by Lily Qi in D15.
In D16, incumbents Marc Korman and Ariana Kelly look set for reelection. It’s a tight race between Samir Paul and Sara Love in a tight race for the third slot with Love ahead by 18 votes!
The ticket of incumbents Kumar Barve and Jim Gilchrist along with Julie Palakovich-Carr look set to win in D17. Incumbent Sen. Cheryl Kagan endorsed Julian Haffner, who trails in fourth by roughly 1400 votes.
In D18, incumbent Al Carr leads the pack with newcomers Emily Shetty and Jared Solomon looking set to join him. Leslie Milano is in fourth but around 1000 votes behind Solomon.
One of two incumbents currently trailing is in D19. Incumbent Bonnie Cullison leads followed by Charlotte Crutchfield. Vaugh Stewart leads incumbent Maricé Morales for the third slot by 133 votes. This one is going to take awhile.
In D20, the ticket of incumbents David Moon and Jhenelle Wilkins along with newcomer Lorig Charkoudian are set to go to Annapolis. Darian Unger trails in fourth.
In D39, incumbent Shane Robinson is struggling in fourth, behind incumbents Kirill Reznik and newcomers Lesley Lopez and Gabriel Acevero. Lopez leads with 3,320 followed by Gabriel Acevero with 3,175 followed by incumbent Kirill Reznik with 3,125. Shane Robinson trails Reznik with 3,032.
Results Update 1: It’s a Great Night for Money
So with more votes in, it’s looking good statewide for Jealous/Turnbull for Governor with around 39% of the vote in a fractured Democratic field.
David Trone looks likely to win the congressional race in CD6 that he lost in CD8 two years ago. He has 40% to 32% for Aruna Miller.
In CD8, the unknown Jamie Raskin is edging out the ubiquitous Utam, Paul with 91% to 4% with Summer Spring sneaking into second with 6%.
In Prince George’s, Angela Alsobrooks is looking at an easy win over Donna Edwards and Anthony Muse.
The Montgomery County Executive race is looking to be the humdinger. Right now, Marc Elrich has 28%, just behind David Blair who has 29% – a difference of 178 votes.
In Council District 1, Andrew Friedson seems comfortably in the lead with 30% of the vote.
In Council District 3, Sidney Katz is fending off a challenge Ben Shnider with 54% to 46%.
Early Voting in MoCo
County Executive
Roger Berliner. . . . . . . . . 4,143 13.15 David Blair. . . . . . . . . . 8,670 27.52 Marc Elrich. . . . . . . . . . 9,000 28.57 Bill Frick . . . . . . . . . . 979 3.11 Rose Krasnow . . . . . . . . . 4,773 15.15 George L. Leventhal . . . . . . . 3,934 12.49
Council At-Large
Gabe Albornoz . . . . . . . . . 9,199 8.19 Rosemary O. Arkoian . . . . . . . 1,295 1.15 Marilyn Balcombe . . . . . . . . 7,152 6.37 Charles Barkley . . . . . . . . 2,253 2.01 Shruti Bhatnagar . . . . . . . . 2,048 1.82 Cherri L. Branson. . . . . . . . 2,425 2.16 Brandy H. M. Brooks . . . . . . . 6,813 6.07 Craig Carozza-Caviness . . . . . . 294 .26 Ron Colbert. . . . . . . . . . 277 .25 Bill Conway. . . . . . . . . . 3,714 3.31 Hoan Dang . . . . . . . . . . 4,497 4.01 Tom R. Falcinelli, Jr. . . . . . . 475 .42 Lorna Phillips Forde. . . . . . . 1,658 1.48 Jill Ortman Fouse. . . . . . . . 3,884 3.46 Loretta Jean Garcia . . . . . . . 1,914 1.70 Paul S. Geller. . . . . . . . . 782 .70 Evan Glass . . . . . . . . . . 9,699 8.64 Richard Gottfried. . . . . . . . 559 .50 Neil H. Greenberger . . . . . . . 1,457 1.30 Seth Grimes. . . . . . . . . . 1,653 1.47 Ashwani Jain . . . . . . . . . 4,874 4.34 Will Jawando . . . . . . . . . 12,080 10.76 David V. Lipscomb. . . . . . . . 426 .38 Melissa McKenna . . . . . . . . 1,647 1.47 Danielle Meitiv . . . . . . . . 3,636 3.24 Hans Riemer. . . . . . . . . . 14,719 13.11 Michele Riley . . . . . . . . . 1,270 1.13 Graciela Rivera-Oven. . . . . . . 1,279 1.14 Darwin Romero . . . . . . . . . 372 .33 Mohammad Siddique. . . . . . . . 1,842 1.64 Jarrett Smith . . . . . . . . . 527 .47 Steve Solomon . . . . . . . . . 1,108 .99 Chris Wilhelm . . . . . . . . . 6,433 5.73
Council District 1
Bill Cook . . . . . . . . . . 148 2.01 Pete Fosselman. . . . . . . . . 696 9.47 Andrew Friedson . . . . . . . . 2,090 28.45 Ana Sol Gutierrez. . . . . . . . 1,514 20.61 Jim McGee . . . . . . . . . . 138 1.88 Regina "Reggie" Oldak . . . . . . 1,405 19.12 Dalbin Osorio . . . . . . . . . 36 .49 Meredith Wellington . . . . . . . 1,320 17.97
Council District 3
Sidney A. Katz. . . . . . . . . 2,981 56.29 Ben Shnider. . . . . . . . . . 2,315 43.71
The Washington Post Ballots
By Adam Pagnucco.
Two ballots were handed out today announcing county-level endorsements by the Washington Post.
The first one shows all of the Post’s endorsements for County Executive, County Council and Board of Education. It has an authority line from David Blair’s campaign. We hear that several other Post-endorsed campaigns distributed it in addition to Blair’s people. The presence of an authority line makes it legal and the fact that it included all the county Post endorsements, not just some, is fair.
The second one shows just four of the Post’s endorsements: County Executive (Blair), Council At-Large (Evan Glass and Marilyn Balcombe) and Council District 1 (Andrew Friedson). The other two Council At-Large Post endorsees (incumbent Hans Riemer and Gabe Albornoz) do not appear. It has no visible authority line. This particular one was distributed in Bethesda but we have no idea how many were handed out. If it indeed lacks an authority line, this ballot violated state election law. It was also misleading because it only partially lists the Council At-Large endorsements. No campaign has admitted responsibility for this flyer.
We have not seen a “Washington Post Ballot” in the past. But if it continues, and if campaigns can agree on funding it, it could conceivably be turned into an alternative to the Apple Ballot.
Results Delayed Until at Least 9PM
Will Jawando’s Diversity Mailer
By Adam Pagnucco.
As Council At-Large candidate Will Jawando points out in the mailer below, MoCo’s population has a majority of people of color but has not elected an at-large Council Member of color since Ike Leggett left the council in 2002. Leggett remains the only person of color ever elected to an at-large seat but we believe Jawando has a great chance to join him.
If Mike Miller is an NRA Tool, He Hides It Well
Senate President Mike Miller has been attacked for accepting donations from the National Rifle Association (NRA). The last donation to Sen. Miller from the NRA occurred in 2009. As Senate President, Miller has a lot of power to derail initiatives he doesn’t like. So what has happened since then?
Maryland now has some of strictest gun control laws on the books. Here are some of the gun safety initiatives that not only passed the Senate on Miller’s watch but also received his vote.
- SB281 of 2013 – Firearm Safety Act of 2013
- SB707 of 2018 – Bump Stocks
- HB1302 of 2018 – Red Flag Bill
- SB224 of 2017 – Closing the Domestic Violence Loophole
- SB512 of 2012 – Allowed MD State Police to Deny a Gun Dealer License
- SB640 of 2012 – Banning Convicted Violent Criminals from Owning a Gun If Convicted Federally or in Another State
- SB248 of 14 – Extended the Statue of Limitations for Possession in a Crime of Violence
Since 2012, he voted against one bill, HB 209, which was a crossfile of SB 640 listed above. It nonetheless passed the Senate.
In short, characterizing Miller as an enemy of gun safety laws isn’t accurate. Miller has not been a barrier to the passage of new gun safety laws and has supported many of the key provisions.
Final MoCo Endorsements
By Adam Pagnucco.
Here is our final list of MoCo institutional endorsements. Don’t ask us to list more because the font is small enough now! We’re not sure what to make of MCGEO’s semi-endorsements of House candidates Gabe Acevero (D-39) and Julian Haffner (D-17) but we will leave them in this chart. One more note: the Washington Post has chosen not to endorse in General Assembly races, something we don’t recall happening in the past.
The Reasons For My Votes
By Adam Pagnucco.
Just like (hopefully) all of you, I am voting in the primary this year. We talk a lot about candidates on Seventh State but not as much about what guides our voting decisions. These are the factors guiding me.
There are two things in my background that weigh heavily on how I evaluate the county and its candidates. First, I’m a native of the Hudson Valley and the Catskills in Upstate New York. I admit bias, but these are two of the prettiest places on Planet Earth! From the end of World War II up through the 1980s, this area was relatively prosperous. The three pillars of the economy were agriculture, tourism and manufacturing with the Borscht Belt hotels and IBM acting as anchor employers. Middle class jobs were common from Poughkeepsie through Monticello. But by the end of the 1980s, the Borscht Belt began emptying out and IBM started layoffs a little later, closing its massive Kingston facility in 1994. The area never recovered. At a young age, I learned this lesson: there is no law of economics holding that a prosperous economy will remain prosperous forever.
There is more. In 1989, I was a bell captain at one of those dying Borscht Belt hotels. My crew was composed mostly of adults who lived paycheck to paycheck, so they were seriously put out when the paychecks started bouncing. One Friday during check-in, my crew and I went into the management offices to demand timely payment of VALID checks. When they refused, I led a walkout. I was fired and about half my crew was too. (That was the start of my interest in the labor movement.) Within a couple years, the hotel was closed. The former owners cashed out and moved to Florida. The workers were out of jobs. Here’s another lesson: economic decline doesn’t hurt the rich. They will be just fine. It’s working people who need a strong economy to live decent lives.
My beloved old hotel, the Stevensville Country Club of Swan Lake, NY, in its glory days.
The second relevant thing in my background is that I’m a corporate and economic researcher. When I decided to move out of D.C. fifteen years ago, I picked MoCo because it had so much going for it: enlightened leadership, good schools, nice amenities, high-quality county services, access to transit and a decent economy. But that was then. Here is some of what I have published on Seventh State over the last two years.
1. MoCo has had one of the worst job creation performances in the entire region since 2001. As of 2016, its employment has still not returned to its pre-recession peak. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics)
2. MoCo’s real per capita personal income took a bigger hit than most of the rest of the region from the Great Recession. (U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis)
3. The county’s establishment growth is almost last in the region. It lags D.C. and Fairfax by huge amounts. (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics)
4. The outmigration of taxpayer income from the county has hit record levels for the last few years. (Internal Revenue Service)
5. While wage and salary employment is flat, MoCo is creating lots of lower-paying proprietor jobs. Most other jurisdictions in the region are creating both. (U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis)
6. Despite telling us that the economy is just fine, county leaders have grabbed tens of millions of dollars in health insurance money just to balance the budget two years in a row. That is despite the nine percent property tax hike of two years ago. And where is the money going? Since the recession ended, spending on education and transportation – two huge investment categories of paramount importance to voters – has increased at half the rate of everything else. (Montgomery County budget documents)
Back in Upstate New York in the 1980s, those who were paying attention could see a little weakness. But for the most part, we didn’t understand that we were in the middle of a tipping point. So it is in MoCo. We have enough strength left that a lot of people don’t feel the above trends in their wallets yet, though they did feel the big tax hike and many suffer long commutes to jobs in D.C. and Virginia. Unless Donald Trump is worse than I think he is, the federal government won’t close down like IBM did. But the data does not lie – we are slipping, folks. And that’s a problem because we need strong revenue growth to fund progressive priorities.
The reaction of the governing establishment to the above posts and more has been disappointing. Some have been indifferent. Others have questioned the economic numbers. (I guarantee that the federal economists downtown who produce those numbers have no hidden agenda to make MoCo politicians look bad!) Some have interpreted discussion of this information as primarily an attack on their records. A few even regard it as a personal attack.
Guess what, politicians? It’s not about you – it’s about us. And we need to do better. Luckily, as one of the few jurisdictions in the nation that combines wealth, education, diversity, tolerance, good schools, low crime, a triple-A bond rating and no municipal corruption, there’s nothing we can’t deal with IF we decide to deal with it.
This year, I am only voting for candidates who understand the nature of the above challenges, have specific ideas for coping with them and – fingers crossed! – have the courage and strategic vision to lead us to our full potential.
And if you want a finer county, so should you.