Maryland’s candidate filing deadline was Tuesday, and the state Senate has not passed the new Gov. Wes Moore-backed congressional map. But the Democrat has an alternative solution in his back pocket.
By missing the time frame, the redrawn map faces new uncertainty for its future, as the state Senate has all but confirmed it’s dead on arrival.
Mr. Moore dismissed time constraint concerns on Tuesday, telling The Washington Post, “These are artificial deadlines. These are deadlines that are made by politicians.”
The Maryland Republican Party dubbed the gerrymandering push “failed” due to the passed deadline.
But the governor’s team is working on a Plan B, the Post reported. The governor’s office did not respond to The Washington Times’ inquiries by publication time.
A survey of all 47 Maryland state senators by The Baltimore Banner found that the redistricting bill would fail if brought to a vote Wednesday. Ten Democrats out of the upper chamber’s 34 Democrats and a dozen Republicans said they opposed the bill.
It needs 29 votes to pass, meaning it’s unlikely to succeed unless Maryland Senate President Bill Ferguson coaxes his fellow Democrats into supporting the legislation — also a slim chance.
The long-shot legislation would present a constitutional amendment to voters on whether new boundaries would be used until the 2030 decennial U.S. census reapportionment.
The mid-decade redistricting would likely give Democrats an 8-0 edge in the congressional delegation, pushing out Rep. Andy Harris, Maryland’s lone GOP congressman.
“Once the state filing deadline has passed, federal courts have taken the position that current maps should be used in the current cycle, and changes can only be made in subsequent cycles,” he said in a statement to The Times. “So if the governor thinks he’s going to make changes at this point, my only comment is, ’See you in federal court, Wes.’”
The Maryland Republican Party said Mr. Harris’ seat is positioned to “stay a strong Republican district that fairly represents the people, and Wes Moore can add another failure to his long list.”
Mr. Harris is not the only one thinking ahead to a showdown in the courts. Mr. Ferguson has been wary about joining the Democratic counterattack redistricting move, arguing that it could backfire on his party.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries visited the state’s Capitol last week, seemingly to push the proposed congressional map toward the Senate floor.
“It’s precisely because we want Leader Jeffries in the majority that most members in the Maryland Senate Democratic Caucus do not support moving forward with mid-cycle redistricting that will backfire in our State courts and lose Democrats in Congress,” Mr. Ferguson said in a statement last week.
Maryland Democrats’ aggressive push to gerrymander followed other blue states’ responses to red states’ redistricting efforts at the behest of President Trump. House Republicans are vying for a larger majority ahead of the November midterm elections as Democrats hope to stamp out the GOP’s thin lead in the lower chamber.
• Mary McCue Bell can be reached at mbell@washingtontimes.com.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.