By Adam Pagnucco.
Council Member Will Jawando declared for county executive on Wednesday night and was joined by County Executive Marc Elrich, Council Members Kristin Mink and Laurie-Anne Sayles and Prince George’s County Executive Aisha Braveboy. The Jawando-Elrich combination in particular was a show of strength – and Jawando was a formidable candidate to begin with. So here is a provocative question:
Is Jawando the early front runner?
Let’s first consider Jawando’s strengths. There are a lot of them.
Silver Spring and Takoma Park
The chart below shows Jawando’s geographic performance in the 2022 council at-large primary. Bars in dark green show a first place finish. Bars in Kelly green are second. Bars in light green are third and bars in yellow are fourth.
Jawando finished first in Downtown Silver Spring and Takoma Park. These are high turnout areas that form an important part of the county’s Democratic base. He adds the Route 29 corridor, home to many of the county’s Black Democrats. That brings us to:
Black Precincts
The chart below shows Jawando’s 2022 performance in the top 25 precincts for each major racial group. He finished first in the 25 most heavily Black precincts in the county. That’s no surprise: Black voters are a big part of his base.
Bullet Voters
Voters in the council at-large primary can vote for up to four candidates since there are four seats at play. Bullet voters are those who choose to vote for only one candidate. They’re an indicator of intensity of support since the county executive race is a one-pick election. Jawando led council at-large candidates in bullet voters in 2022 as shown in the chart below.
Note the gap between Jawando and one of his rivals, Council Member Evan Glass. Glass led Jawando among all voters, but among those who chose just one candidate, Jawando had a big lead. Is this a preview of county executive voting?
Progressive Endorsements
In his two prior races for council, Jawando was endorsed by MCEA, the Sierra Club, Casa in Action, SEIU Locals 500 and 32-BJ, LIUNA, Progressive Maryland, and the career Fire Fighters in both races. That doesn’t guarantee that any of them will pick him in a one-candidate race. But he will have a shot at getting support from a lot of them next year.
Fundraising
Jawando isn’t a great fundraiser like potential rival Council Member Andrew Friedson, but he is a solid fundraiser in both traditional and public financing. Like Glass, Jawando will almost certainly max out in public financing and will have enough money to get his message out to voters.
Elrich’s Support
County Executive Marc Elrich’s support is a plus for Jawando. They share many of the same strengths in geography and relationships with progressive groups. Elrich adds ancient relationships in housing-skeptical parts of the civic community, which Jawando is attempting to court by opposing the attainable housing initiative and tax abatements for some development. Elrich is a controversial figure among some, but Jawando won’t lose many votes due to his support and this should be a net gain.
Elrich appears at Jawando’s kickoff.
I could go on, but isn’t that enough?
Jawando has weaknesses too. They include:
Geographic Weak Spots
The geographic chart above shows that Jawando did not run particularly well in Upcounty, much of the southwest and Rockville. That latter jurisdiction matters a lot as Rockville has a ton of Democratic voters in it.
Taxes
Jawando’s repeated support for tax increases (reinforced recently when he teamed up with Elrich to advocate for an income tax hike) won’t go over well with tax-weary voters. My hunch is that this is a growing part of the Democratic electorate and it will be a stronghold for Friedson once he gets in. (When are you getting in, Andrew?)
Crime
Jawando’s past support for defunding police and his introduction of measures like restricting traffic stops are a huge liability among voters concerned about crime – and there will be a lot of them. This may be his greatest weakness.
Hostility from the Real Estate Community
The local real estate community despises Jawando because of his fervent support for rent control among other things. They don’t have a lot of votes but they do have money. I expect them to form a Super PAC and attack Jawando on crime and other issues. As a matter of fact, Jawando is probably the candidate most likely to attract attacks by an outside group.
I’m not listing housing as a strength or weakness. Jawando has essentially adopted Elrich’s position of skepticism about attainable housing and tax breaks for many development projects. That will lose some votes but pick up others. It was critical to earning Elrich’s support. For me, this is a push.
So how does all of the above add up? I’m not ready to declare a front runner now because there are too many shoes yet to drop. For example: which other candidates will get in the race? Will there be a serious female candidate? (This race could really use one!) Who will get the Apple Ballot? Who will the Washington Post endorse (if they endorse)? How much money will Friedson raise? What will outside groups do? And to paraphrase Don Rumsfeld, those are just the known unknowns – there could be plenty of unknown unknowns too.
But right now, Jawando is looking strong. How strong will he look a year from now?