By Adam Pagnucco.
Part One summarized my methodology of consulting my source network on who they believe will most likely be the next county executive. Part Two featured a few general comments from sources. Part Three revealed my sources’ number eight pick (soon-to-be-former Congressman David Trone) and number seven pick (David Blair). Part Four revealed number six (Council Member Gabe Albornoz) and number five (Council Member Kate Stewart). Part Five revealed number four (Chief Administrative Officer Rich Madaleno) and number three (Council Member Will Jawando). And Part Six revealed number two (Council Member Evan Glass) and number one (Council Member Andrew Friedson).
Until now, I have said nothing. All comments have come from my sources. I will have a lot to write about this race in coming months, but for this moment, I will say this: it’s soooooo early.
Let’s go back to the world of 2015. County Executive Ike Leggett had won his third and final term in the previous year. Soon enough, it became obvious to the county’s political community that he was not interested in running again (and the passage of term limits in 2016 prevented him from doing so). If I had run this survey in 2015, the top three finishers would likely have been Council Members Marc Elrich, George Leventhal and Roger Berliner. All were veteran council members who had been interested in running for executive for quite some time and were sure to take their shot when the opportunity was at hand.
However, it didn’t work out that way. Yes, all three did run in 2018, but they were not the top three finishers. Elrich won by a hair and the next two spots were occupied by 2015-era unknowns: businessman David Blair and former Rockville mayor and planning staffer Rose Krasnow. Blair had a fresh, economic-heavy message backed by tons of money and Krasnow was the only woman in the field. That result would not have been foreseen three years earlier.
So yes, my sources’ picks make sense in the political world of what we know today. But will that world look the same two years from now? Here are a few things that could make June 2026 look different than November 2024.
1. What will happen with the next two budgets?
County Executive Marc Elrich is not out of office yet and he will be recommending two more budgets to the county council. We know that he loves tax increases. What’s to stop him from proposing one or two more? And if he does, how big will they be and how will the council (including its executive candidates) react to them? And how will our interest groups react to those reactions? The politics will be hot and heavy and everybody will be thinking about the next executive race.
2. Will the Washington Post endorse candidates for county executive?
Last month, the Post’s editorial board was hit by defections in the wake of its failure to endorse a presidential candidate. Its former lead editorial writer for Maryland (Lee Hockstader) has been stationed in Europe for a few years now. Its board rarely bothers to write about our county anymore and it sat out this year’s school board elections for the first time in memory. If the Post decides not to endorse for county executive, it will have a big impact on the fortunes of those who run.
3. What outside money will play?
We may have had public financing in our elections since 2018, but outside money from the business and labor communities has played a big part in our executive and council raises. We even attracted a half-million dollars from a Facebook billionaire last time. Who will play next time and why?
4. Will the General Assembly pass enabling legislation for ranked choice voting?
Ranked choice voting (RCV) bills have bounced around the General Assembly for a while now and one wonders whether they will eventually pass enabling legislation for counties. If they do, my hunch is that MoCo will adopt it, if for no other reason than that our leaders love progressive fads. That will change the calculations of the contenders and perhaps even encourage surprise entrants. And that brings us to:
5. Who will be the outsider candidate(s)?
In 2018, it was David Blair. Blair tried again in 2022 and he came painfully close to winning both times. That has to be encouraging to any other outsiders, especially with self-funding capacity, who believe that they can run the county better than representatives of its long-time progressive oligarchy. It’s also easy to see an unheralded female candidate get in if the early field consists entirely of men. In 2018, Krasnow was a late entrant who was unknown to most of the county but she still beat out political pros like Berliner and Leventhal. Will there be a Blair? Will there be a Krasnow? Will there be someone else we don’t know? I think there just might be.
6. What does the entire field look like?
This factor matters because candidate demographics and geography can overlap. For example, if multiple candidates who are strong in the same region run, they could split the votes there and allow a rival from a different part of the county to win. I have some data on this and I’ll elaborate in a future post.
7. Will there be a Trump effect?
Could the return of Donald Trump to the White House affect the next executive race? You might think not since he won’t be endorsing any of our Democratic candidates. (Imagine if he did!) But Trump’s presence in the Oval Office could spark a resurgence of the progressive left, thereby fueling any candidate adept enough (and left-wing enough) to capture it. This impact, if it happens, will be hard to measure but we may have gotten an early taste of it in post-election comments by Council Member Kristin Mink.
So there it is, folks. We have just set foot on the first brick in the Yellow Brick Road to the 2026 county executive inauguration. Keep coming back and we will walk on that road together!