Maryland’s Democratic primary race for U.S. Senate is barely underway, but Rep. David Trone (D-Md.) has already dramatically outspent the field, new campaign finance reports show.
Maryland
Trone loans himself $10M in financially lopsided Md. race for Senate
The rare open seat is expected to draw cash and attention in a presidential election year in which control of the Senate is on the line. In deep-blue Maryland, most eyes are focused on the highly competitive Democratic field, where candidates are each pitching themselves as a progressive standard-bearer.
Trone, a three-term congressman, has highlighted his executive experience and track-record of working across the aisle in what many political observers see as a two-person race between Trone and Prince George’s County Executive Angela D. Alsobrooks. Leader of a wealthy, majority-Black suburb of D.C., Alsobrooks emphasizes her background as a single Black mother and career prosecutor in arguing that the Senate needs more people with her life experience.
Trone, who has funneled millions into his House races, has lent himself $9.7 million since April and raised another $108,000, leaving $5.3 million remaining in his account. The Trone campaign has sent mail statewide and aired biographical television ads.
The three-term congressman has vowed to rely on his own resources and small-dollar donors, promising not to take money from any political action committees, lobbyists or corporations. However, he reported that $84,500 of the money he raised was from donors bundled by a website run by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, known as AIPAC, a pro-Israel lobbying committee.
“We are showing Marylanders from Oakland to Ocean City and everywhere in between that I’ll be a Senator who listens to them, understands the issues they face, and will be ready on day one to make a difference in their lives,” Trone said in a statement.
The spending sum is nearly three times what his closest competitor raised in the first seven weeks of her campaign, overshadowing an otherwise aggressive fundraising haul.
Alsobrooks (D) took in $1.7 million, according to campaign finance reports, and spent $392,000, leaving $1.3 million in the bank.
Alsobrooks’s campaign manager, Dave Chase, noted in a campaign memo circulated this month that her seven-week haul was a record-breaking pace for comparable statewide Maryland campaigns.
While the contest is still wide open, political observers say, most attention has focused on the fight between self-funding Trone and Alsobrooks, whose candidacy presents a historic opportunity to elect Maryland’s first Black senator and send the nation’s third Black woman to the chamber.
Montgomery County Council member Will Jawando (D-At Large), whose candidacy also holds historic potential to deliver the state’s first Black senator, raised $519,000 in two months. He spent more than a third of it — about $200,000 — and had $314,000 remaining in his account at the end of June, according to his campaign finance report.
“We’re just getting started,” Jawando said in a statement, going on to characterize himself as a “true blue progressive” and acknowledging that “there may be other candidates in this race who have more personal wealth and establishment support.”
Finance reports for the second quarter of the year were due by midnight Saturday. Two other lower-profile candidates who have filed paperwork to run — Republican Robin Ficker and Democrat Steven Henry Seuferer — did not have reports posted as of Saturday afternoon.
Cardin, 79, is ending a half-century career in public service that spanned state and federal government and three terms in the Senate.