By Adam Pagnucco.
Now that a reduction in county executive term limits from three to two is on the ballot, County Executive Marc Elrich is gearing up for a fight. And with real estate money fueling the other side, an all-out ballot campaign looks likely to erupt sooner rather than later.
Let’s connect the dots. First, Elrich discussed term limits on Kojo Nnamdi’s Politics Hour on August 30. Following is a transcript of the discussion between Elrich, Nnamdi and long-time regional reporter Tom Sherwood.
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Sherwood: You’re in your second term. You won in 2022, narrowly I believe and you expect people… I think you’ve said you’re going to run for a third term?
Elrich: Yes.
Sherwood: But however, you’re on the ballot in a way this year because there is a referendum matter in Montgomery County to limit the county executive to two terms. That means if it passes in November, you would not be allowed to run for a third term in 2026. So one, what are you doing to defeat that referendum if you wanted to defeat it – I assume you do – and two, if it passes, what next for you? Would you run again for the council, an at-large council seat, or an old council…
Nnamdi: I know an elementary school looking for a teacher, but go ahead please.
Elrich: Well first of all, we’re organizing against the referendum.
Sherwood: What is the principal argument against the referendum? Because the council members get three consecutive terms, why should the council…
Elrich: So we already have term limits. One of the things they did when they were getting signatures, it’s like we need to limit the executive to two terms, a lot of people assumed they didn’t have term limits for the executive. I already have a term limit. And I will be on the ballot two years from now. So if they want to defeat me, why don’t they wait two years and beat me in the ballot? But the Republicans got somewhere less than 25% of the vote. I got somewhere close to 73, 75 percent of the vote. So they’re not going to beat me, they didn’t beat me the first time. The primary was tough…
Sherwood: You contend this is a back door way of getting you out of office, they couldn’t beat you on the ballot…
Elrich: We had witnesses to people, when they were getting signatures, and all they did was talk about me.
Sherwood: Are you going to mount a campaign against the referendum?
Elrich: Yeah, yeah.
Sherwood: OK. And again, you would hope that it doesn’t pass, but if it does pass, what… it will affect whatever your future is, but also how you’ll do the next two years of what you’ll try to get done as county executive.
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Elrich then shifted to his policy agenda, including his desire to raise taxes on commercial property.
Term limits leader Reardon Sullivan (left) gathers voter signatures at the county fair in August 2023.
On to the second dot. On September 6, a new ballot issue committee called Against Question A: Make Your Vote Count was established to oppose the term limits charter amendment. The chair is Silver Spring resident Ronald Wright and the treasurer is Brookeville resident Lauri Rodich. Rodich’s husband is the former executive director of SEIU Local 500, which represents support staff in MCPS. I asked Wright and Rodich about their plans for the committee and have not received a statement as of this writing.
Third, the teachers union has come out against the term limits charter amendment. That raises the prospect that opposition to term limits will be on the Apple Ballot in November.
Fourth, Elrich has asked for help from the Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee (MCDCC), which has weighed in on ballot questions in the past. If MCDCC opposes term limits, that position will be reflected on the county Democrats’ sample ballot, which is typically distributed to Democratic voters prior to the general election.
Add all of this up and it looks like a substantial effort to oppose term limits. Supporters of the term limits effort had better not go to sleep, because if they do, Elrich could survive.
There is one more dot. All events described above are recent developments. In fact, Team Elrich has been battling term limits quietly for months. I have obtained documents chronicling some – but assuredly not all – of the activities waged by Elrich’s supporters to save him. Those documents will be revealed next week!
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