By Adam Pagnucco.
As Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks and former Governor Larry Hogan begin their duel for Maryland’s crucial U.S. Senate seat, it’s time to start looking at the field of battle. And in any political campaign, that field starts and ends with the voters.
The most obvious characteristic of the Maryland electorate is its partisan nature. Combining the presidential general elections in 2008, 2012, 2016 and 2020, the average party composition of actual voters has been 57% Democrat, 27% Republican, 15% unaffiliated and 1% other parties. That mix has been relatively stable over those years. It is not that different from the composition of the general electorate in the two years in which Hogan was elected (2014 and 2018). One major difference is that presidential electorates are significantly larger than gubernatorial electorates, placing a premium on fundraising.
Here are two Hogan stats that should give Democrats pause.
1. In the 2014 general election, 54% of voters were Democrats and 32% were Republicans, a Dem advantage of 23 points. Hogan won 51% of the vote. Four years later, 57% of the voters were Democrats and 27% were Republicans, a Dem advantage of 30 points. Hogan won 55% of the vote. As the general electorate became more Democratic, Hogan got stronger.
2. In 2018, I wrote a column for Bethesda Beat dissecting Hogan’s general election results in MoCo. Against a ticket that had a long-time MoCo political figure running for lieutenant governor, Hogan won in most of the county’s geography, including Damascus, Potomac, Olney, Rockville, Gaithersburg and Clarksburg. Hogan even came within 11 votes of winning in Bethesda on election day. Hogan lost the county overall primarily because he was blown out in East County, especially in Downtown Silver Spring.
So we have established that Hogan is skilled at peeling away Democrats, possibly more than any Maryland Republican in modern history. Who are these Democrats? If I were on Team Alsobrooks, I would be intensely interested in learning about them. (Fred Yang, this is a job for you.) Until more information becomes available about these folks, my best guess is that they trend White, male and rural and that they are disproportionately concerned about crime.
If I’m right, then guess what, folks? Take a look at the crosstabs from the May 6-8 Emerson College poll, which found Alsobrooks possessing a narrow edge over Congressman David Trone in the primary and a larger lead over Hogan in the general. Trone had advantages among Democrats who were White, male and concerned about crime. Now take a look at the primary election returns by county. Alsobrooks won the primary in the greater I-95 corridor linking Baltimore and the Washington suburbs. Trone blew her out in Western Maryland (which he represents in Congress) and the Eastern Shore.
White male rural Democrats who care about crime. These are Trone Democrats. In the past, I bet many of them have been Hogan Democrats. If Alsobrooks can hold onto them, she wins. If not, Hogan has a path to victory.
Holding Trone voters along with turning out the progressive base – which should be comparatively easy for Alsobrooks – should be a paramount task for the Democrats. That’s why attacks on Trone like the kind mounted by Delegate Jheanelle Wilkins are so ruinous. When you repeatedly accuse Trone of trying to buy the election even after you have won, what are you saying to his voters? By implication, you are telling them that they are stupid enough to get bought. Alsobrooks fell into this trap herself in a May 18 email gloating that she had defeated “a self-funding multi-millionaire.” What voters vote for candidates who insult them?
This is exactly what Hogan wants as he sets up his Democrats for Hogan group. And while Alsobrooks and her supporters spike the ball, this is what Hogan had to say about Trone on the day after the election.
Alsobrooks holds all the cards. All she has to do is consolidate all the Democrats, including the Trone Democrats, and she wins. Is her team up to the challenge? Or will Hogan exploit divisions among the Dems and deliver the U.S. Senate to the party of Trump?