By Adam Pagnucco.
County Executive Marc Elrich dislikes term limits. And he dislikes the lead organizer for term limits, former GOP executive candidate Reardon “Sully” Sullivan, even more. Sully unsuccessfully ran against Elrich two years ago and the executive has not forgotten. Fox 5’s Tom Fitzgerald, who has a knack for getting spicy quotes from politicians, has recounted all of the above in graphic fashion!
In interviews on Tuesday, Fitzgerald asked Sullivan and Elrich to comment on the merits of term limits. Here is what they said.
Sullivan: The majority of the people who signed the petition were Democrats. And it’s just people who understand the idea of good governance that term limits does make sense for the highest office in the county.
Elrich: I have public policies. If you don’t like the public policies, run against me and beat me. And then you show up and get 24% of the vote and lose pretty badly. I’m not sure whether I reflect your public policy that people want or he reflects public policy.
NOT a fan of term limits.
So Sully is making a policy case for term limits and Elrich is calling him a sore loser. Fitzgerald even said that Elrich “believes this term limit effort is based on revenge.”
I don’t have strong views on term limits. My favorite argument against them is this one: “We already have term limits. They’re called elections.” There are many other policy-based arguments against term limits. Former Charter Review Commission Chairman Paul Bessel and Barbara Braswell wrote a 76-page analysis arguing against them in 2016 that’s full of ammo of opponents.
Now for all we know, Elrich may have made a policy-based case against term limits to Fitzgerald. But even if he did, Elrich has been around long enough to know how the jackals of the media operate. (Don’t get offended, press people – I’m a jackal too!) You can talk to a press person for an hour but it’s the one saucy sentence you give them that they will actually use. If you don’t want them to use it, don’t give it to them!
And so Sully comes across like a statesman while Fitz films Elrich making schoolyard taunts. Sully will take that every day of the week. If these are the kinds of arguments that voters hear, what do you think they will do?