There’s no denying the fact that Senate Democrats are facing an unusually difficult election cycle, and there’s no mystery as to why: Several incumbents are running in increasingly “red” states where Donald Trump is all but certain to win with relative ease.
The 2024 Senate landscape, however, has one important exception: Maryland.
By any fair measure, the Old Line State is a Democratic stronghold, and Vice President Kamala Harris is expected to cruise to an easy victory in Maryland in the fall. But the state’s voters will also choose a new U.S. senator on the same ballot, and former two-term Republican Gov. Larry Hogan appears to be running a competitive statewide campaign.
As one would expect, he’s doing so by trying to distance himself from his own party. The Washington Post reported last week:
Former Maryland governor Larry Hogan is running a new ad describing himself as one of the few Republicans who “never caved” to Donald Trump and touting his record sending National Guard troops to the Capitol during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack. Scenes of the rioting that day have littered ads for Democratic candidates over the years, but Hogan is probably the only Republican in the country to feature them as he seeks to distinguish himself from the former president in a deep-blue state.
The commercial features a narrator who tells viewers that the GOP candidate was “an early critic of Donald Trump.”
Around the same time, Hogan’s campaign released a similar ad, assuring Maryland voters he’d be an “independent swing vote” in the Senate.
The strategy is in line with common sense. If, hypothetically, the former Republican governor ran ads featuring his arm around Ted Cruz, he’d lose in a landslide. Maryland is one of the nation’s bluest states, so it stands to reason that Hogan is going out of his way to distance himself from his party and commit to an “independent” streak.
But it’s not quite that simple. A Democratic source tracking media buys confirmed that the National Republican Senatorial Committee — the entity within the party responsible for electing Republican Senate incumbents and candidates — has partnered with Hogan, jointly investing over $1.6 million in support of Hogan since early August.
The Maryland Republican has also benefited from fundraising events with prominent conservative officials from his party, including Senate Minority Whip John Thune, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and former House Speaker Paul Ryan. A recent Maryland Matters report added, “On Sept. 12, he’ll be in Nashville, at a fundraiser sponsored by Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee (R) and former Gov. Bill Haslam (R), along with former U.S. Sens. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Bill Frist, the one-time Senate GOP leader. U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) is listed as the featured speaker.” Are these Republican officials trying to propel Hogan past Prince George’s County Executive Angela Alsobrooks because they believe he’ll be an “independent” vote in the Senate? Or is it more likely they’re counting on Hogan to strengthen his party’s increasingly conservative Senate conference? Chances are, it’s the latter.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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