Earlier this month, I joined countless Marylanders in filing my federal and state income tax returns.

As I did so, the timeless observations of Benjamin Franklin came to mind – “In this world nothing is certain except death and taxes.”

After the Maryland General Assembly adjourned, I suggest Ben was only partly right.

I suggest that in Maryland, almost certain are new state taxes, state tax increases, new state fees, and state fee increases. The only uncertainties about them are when and how much.

Before the 2024 Maryland General Assembly adjourned for the year, this matter was discussed at length, but never fully settled. Some relatively modest tax and fee increases were approved, but none as large as or as far reaching as expected.

None will be approved throughout the balance of this year. The earliest formal discussions on any tax increases can happen is after the General Assembly reconvenes in January 2025.

Battle lines are already being drawn.

Proponents and opponents of tax increases are busy organizing and promoting their positions. Not surprisingly, there are stark and irreconcilable differences between them.

The Maryland Public Policy Institute recently released a statement headlined “Tax Increases Are Never Inevitable.”

The statement includes the following messages — “Maryland’s political leaders would have us believe the state is in a fiscal mess through no fault of their own and that the only solution is massive tax hikes that they’ve put on hold – for now. However, this narrative misrepresents the problem and ignores a real and preferable solution. When pressed, responsible lawmakers admit that the primary cause of the budget chaos at both state and county levels is the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future (a.k.a. Kirwan) education plan. The Spending Affordability Committee projected that budget shortfalls will increase substantially over the next five years “due to the need for general funds to support costs related to the Blueprint.”

The recommended treatments are to “minimize the enactment of new mandates,” increase “efficiency,” and “consider revenue options.” Sadly, legislators seem focused only on that last tactic – i.e., tax hikes. But the Blueprint is not Holy Writ etched in stone. And tax hikes on hard-working Marylanders are not inevitable. Instead of pretending to have no way out, lawmakers could choose to alter the Blueprint’s mandates or eliminate it altogether.”

Supporters of Kirwan, especially the Democratic supermajorities in the General Assembly and the state teachers’ union, have a much different view.
They support increasing state revenues to a level to ensure Kirwan is fully implemented as it was written when the current version was approved by the General Assembly.

They believe they have public support for that. They may be right.

A recent article in the Baltimore Sun had the following headline – “Majority of Statewide Voters Support Blueprint for Maryland’s Future.”

The article included the following.

“An overwhelming majority of Marylanders support the state’s ambitious Blueprint for Maryland’s Future education plan, according to a new poll done for The Baltimore Sun, the University of Baltimore, and FOX45. Nearly three-quarters of the 1,300 likely general election voters polled across Maryland said they supported the Blueprint. When the poll asked about potential changes to the plan to lessen its financial pressures on local [education] budgets, 55% said they supported making some reduction, such as cutting all-day prekindergarten programs (24%), or teacher pay raises (11%). However, 29% said they would not cut anything.’”

The professional pollster who conducted the survey opined the results indicate “profound, widespread” support among voters for the landmark education plan, tempered by “a willingness to set adjustments.

He further observed, “It’s very hard to argue against public education. The intent [of the Blueprint] tracks with the priorities of Maryland voters.”

I suggest the results of this survey, like the results of all surveys, only reflect public sentiment at a point in time. How durable those poll results are has yet to be seen.

The pollster did acknowledge one huge unresolved issue that cannot be ignored going forward. He said, “Local school boards will have to balance how to fund their school districts with meeting their Blueprint financial burden, which could force [school board] members to cut local initiatives. Will it force school boards to cut other things? That’s where the electoral equation changes,”

That is a key observation that leads to more certainty in discussions and debates on taxes and fees in Maryland.

Between now and January 2025, supporters and opponents of Kirwan will be aggressively engaged in efforts to inform, galvanize, and mobilize voters to support their respective positions, ranging from maintaining Kirwan as presently written, adopting modifications to Kirwan and the necessity for and scope of revenue sources needed to fully fund implantation of whatever the final form Kirwan turns out to be.

Depending on the outcomes, those efforts may continue well beyond next year.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

In November, the every four-year routine of counting votes to determine who has been elected as the U.S. President will, as always, generate intense and widely followed media coverage.

While much attention will be focused on the popular vote results nationwide, the most important and meaningful results are which candidate carried enough states to win in the electoral college. Accordingly, media reporting on election night will focus largely on which states went red and which states went blue.

For this commentary, I did a deep dive into the history of the origins, uses, and perhaps some largely forgotten practice changes over time on red and blue color labeling in the American political arena. 

There are several thoughts on how color labels came to be used in American politics. Some suggest they came from Britain’s Parliament, where blue has long been associated with their right-leaning political party (the Conservative Party), and red has long been associated with their left-leaning political party (the Liberal Party).

I suggest a more plausible explanation was the decision by American television networks to use color images in their coverage of presidential election results.

The late 1950s and early 1960s included a wide range of changes in American culture. One was a massive shift in how Americans received entertainment and news in their homes. 

After World War II, steadily increasing numbers of Americans stopped listening to radios and started watching television. That trend accelerated when color televisions became more affordable and more widely found in American living rooms. By 1972, a majority of American households had color televisions.

Then, as now, the most important measure of success for television broadcasters is attracting and retaining viewers. The more viewers, the more revenue from commercials. What better way to do that than to use colorful and easy-to-understand updates in news broadcasts for election night coverage of presidential elections? 

For almost 50 years, presidential election results coverage by the three legacy networks (ABC, NBC, and CBS) had no uniform protocol on which colors to use to identify state results for presidential election candidates.

In some presidential election cycles, ABC, NBC, and CBS used blue to designate states won by the Democratic presidential candidate, in other years they used red. The color pattern was reversed with designating state states won by the Republican presidential candidate. In one election cycle, for unexplained reasons, ABC used yellow to designate states won by the Republican presidential candidate. The unintended outcome was confusion especially with viewers who were “channel surfers” continuously searching for the most recent results.

No small wonder that veteran journalism observer Jodi Enda wrote the following in a 2020 Smithsonian Magazine article When Republicans Were Blue and Democrats Were Red. — “In the beginning, blue was red and red was blue, and they changed back and forth from election to election and network to network in what appears, in hindsight, to be a flight of whimsy.”

Uniformity and continuity with color assignments finally became the norm, starting with the 1996 presidential election cycle.

 Presently ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, FOX, and MSNBC all use the same color guidelines. They use blue for identifying states won by Democratic presidential candidates and red for identifying states won by Republican presidential candidates. 

Beginning in the 2000 presidential election cycle, the use of colors expanded greatly beyond being used to display state-by-state presidential election results.

Since then, red and blue labels have been used and are routinely used to label political candidates and elected officials at all levels, campaigns, and where partisan elections are held — states, counties, cities, and towns.

No doubt that will continue, but one major change may be in the future due to steadily increasing numbers of unaffiliated voters and independent candidates.

Despite the fact that no third-party or independent presidential candidate has had success in winning states in presidential elections since George Wallace won five states and forty-six electoral votes in 1968, it may happen again.   It may happen as soon as this year. 

In recent years, two current U. S. Senators have already been elected after running as independents – Bernie Sanders in Vermont and Angus King in Maine.

If or when an independent or third-party candidate wins a state or states in a presidential campaign, the new color used to record that may be purple, reflecting a new normal when blue and red are no longer the exclusive options.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

 

 

On June 30, 1952, a ribbon cutting in Anne Arundel County marked the beginning and the end of transportation options between Maryland’s eastern shore and western shore. On that day, the first Chesapeake Bay Bridge opened for vehicular traffic. That same day, a ferry service that had carried 2 million passengers and 1 million vehicles on the Bay since being launched in 1930 ended. Conventional wisdom then was ferry service would never return to the Bay. Now an effort is underway to return ferry service that is very different from that which ended abruptly 72 years ago.

Currently, nine Maryland counties — Queen Anne’s, Anne Arundel, Calvert, Somerset, St. Mary’s, Wicomico, Talbot, Kent, and Dorchester plus the City of Annapolis are working with a consultant to study the feasibility of a new passenger-only ferry service on the Bay. Their final report will include recommendations on next steps if the consultant’s feasibility study concludes such a service is viable and sustainable. Below is the current map of potential routes. It is a work in progress. Routes may be added deleted or modified.

With all due respect to the supporters of this concept, I suggest there are two critical issues they need to consider if they have not done so already.

One issue is the ferry vessel under serious consideration for the proposed new service. It is the Candela P-12 all-electric ferry. It sells for approximately $2 million, does not carry vehicles, seats a maximum of 30 passengers, and has limited storage space for carry-ons such as bicycles, strollers, and wheelchairs.

This vessel will not be a practical alternative for the huge number of tourists who use Route 50 when going to Ocean City (“downy shore”).

Accordingly, this proposed new ferry service is not likely to generate significant support from eastern shore residents and public officials hoping for a solution to regular summer traffic jams on Route 50.

The second issue is the increasingly limited potential for state funding for this concept.

During the past several weeks in the General Assembly, there have been intense (and yet to be resolved) differences of opinion on how to address structural deficits in the state transportation trust fund and projected structural deficits in the state budget. Those deficits are almost certain to become worse based on the devastating impact on the state economy and state revenues from the tragic collapse of the Key Bridge in Baltimore.

Securing state funding for the launch and operation of a new ferry service on the Bay is not going to be a high priority in Annapolis in the foreseeable future.

I am not suggesting these are insurmountable obstacles or the only obstacles. I am suggesting they are very serious obstacles that cannot be ignored by the proponents of returning ferry service on the Bay.

One path forward may be securing private investment for this concept from investors with the resources to launch and operate it.

Otherwise, returning ferry service to the Chesapeake Bay may be an interesting idea whose time has not yet come.

David Reel is a public relations and public affairs consultant who lives in Easton.

 

 

A recent chain of events led me to think about another chain of events during World War II for a young girl who once aspired to be a famous writer. 

She ultimately achieved that goal, but not in a way that she had ever dreamed about or ever aspired to do.

Her name is Anne Frank. 

Anne died at age 15, along with most of her family, in a Nazi concentration camp. 

Before she and her family were sent to the concentration camp, they spent two years hiding from the Nazis in a secret sealed apartment in Amsterdam. During that time, Anne kept a written diary now known as The Diary of Anne Frank.

Her diary was published posthumously in 1947. Translated into almost seventy languages it is one of the most widely read accounts of the Holocaust. 

I had largely forgotten about Anne Frank and her diary until a series of unexpected events unfolded during a recent weekend. 

On a Saturday afternoon, my wife and I drove to St. Michaels to enjoy a beautiful early spring day. It was a by all measures, a perfect day.

The next morning was far from perfect. 

It started when my wife launched a frantic search for her wallet. Like most wallets, it contained her driver’s license, credit cards, and health insurance cards. It also included a substantial amount of cash for a Monday bank deposit to be used to pay for a long-planned and much-needed home improvement project. 

After retracing all her Saturday steps, we concluded her wallet likely fell out of her back pocket while we were sitting on a park bench in St. Michaels. 

I called the St. Michaels police to ask if anyone had turned in a lost wallet. The answer was no, not yet. The officer volunteered to go to the park and search for it. When he called back, he told us there was no trace of it. He also told us some who find lost wallets take the cash and throw the wallet into a trash can. He was kind enough to search the trash can in the park, but with no success.

Once we accepted that reality, I started to write a list of all the onerous tasks that follow the loss of a wallet. 

Angry and frustrated, I said to my wife, “This is what the world has come to. No one cares anymore except about themselves. You lose a wallet, and no one turns it in. Worse yet, they probably took your cash and credit cards with no remorse telling themselves it was an unexpected stroke of “good luck.”

Minutes later, there was knock at our front door. A couple from Washington DC whom we had never seen before told us they were also visiting St. Michaels on Saturday. They discovered her wallet. Using the address on my wife’s driver’s license they drove to our house on their return to Washington and delivered it.

They refused any reward other than accepting a heartfelt thank you.

As I reflected upon that unexpected random act of honesty and kindness my thoughts turned to Anne Frank and words Anne she wrote in her diary.

With a wisdom and eloquence well beyond her years she penned “It’s difficult in times like these: ideals, dreams and cherished hopes rise within us, only to be crushed by grim reality. It’s a wonder I haven’t abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart.”

With all due respect to the memory of Anne, I cannot fully embrace her thinking that people are truly good at heart. Many are, but some are not and never will be. This was confirmed by her death, the deaths of most of her family (all but her father who saved her diary) and at least six million other innocent people who perished in concentration camps during the holocaust. 

That said, our experience with a lost wallet was a reminder the best way to honor the legacy of Anne Frank is simple. Not always easy but a most meaningful way. 

In difficult times like these when dreams and cherished hopes rise within us, only to be crushed by grim reality; we can and we should strive very day to be people who are “truly good at heart.” 

David Reel is a public relations and public affairs consultant who lives in Easton. 

Since the Republicans reclaimed a majority of seats in the U.S. House of Representatives in the last election cycle, a recurring issue has been the impact of conservative Republican members (notably the Freedom Caucus) on efforts by the House Republican leadership to reach consensus on such issues as government spending, debt limits, aid to Ukraine, and southern border security. 

As that division continues, some observers of the Maryland General Assembly like to say, “With a Democratic supermajority in both houses of our General Assembly here, we don’t have all the division and disruption that they have in Congress.” 

Recent events in Annapolis cast serious doubt on that observation. 

In the current General Assembly session, there has been and is deep divide over the state budget and tax increases to fund it between the leadership of the Democratic super majorities in the State House and in the State Senate.

Last week, the state Senate approved their version of the state budget with relatively little debate and rancor. It ultimately passed unanimously with yes votes from every Democratic Senator and all but one Republican Senator (who was not present that day due to a death in his family). 

The day after the Senate version of the state budget was adopted in the Senate, the Democratic leadership in the Maryland House announced a $1.3 billion revenue plan to be paid for with expanded corporate taxes, legalized internet gaming, and new fees on ridesharing, tolls, and electric vehicles. They did so, maintaining now is the time to adopt tax and fee increases to help ensure there will be full funding in the future for three high-priority initiatives for House of Delegate progressives. Those initiatives include funding public education as called for in the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future (The Kirwan Plan), addressing chronic deficits in the state transportation trust fund, and addressing climate change.

The response to that announcement from the Democratic President in the Maryland Senate was immediate and blunt. He said “I don’t think there’s much room for compromise. We [the Senate] will not be considering wholesale or significant increases to Maryland taxes.”

Extending an olive branch to the Democratic House leadership, the Senate President did say that Democratic Senate and House leaders share the same priorities. He also did not rule out the possibility of the Senate considering a revenue package “next year.” 

At this point, no one knows for sure what will happen on a final state budget that must be approved before the General Assembly adjourns early next month.

The wild card on all the discussions on current as well as future state budgets, tax increases and fee increases is Governor Moore. 

So far, in this budget debate he has embraced the position of the Democratic Senate leadership. Asked if that position would hold beyond the current year, Moore has said, “I just know that the bar for raising taxes not just this year, but for every single year for me, it’s going to be a very high bar.” Last Friday, the governor focused instead on Maryland’s post-pandemic lagging economy and the role of a more robust economy in expanding Maryland’s tax base. Moore said, “For the past five years, Maryland’s economy has grown by .2%. The average state has grown by 7.5. So, we’ve got to get this economy moving. There is a way that we can continue growing, be bold, and also know that any conversations around taxes are going to have a very high bar.”

Now is the time for the governor to say even more. 

He can share his definition of what constitutes a “very high bar” for any discussions on evaluating tax increases. He can share his plans to get Maryland’s economy moving. He can use his office as a bully pulpit to spread the message that his overall strategy is taking bold steps to improve Maryland’s economy, create jobs, retain current jobs, bring new businesses and population to Maryland, and keep current businesses and current residents in Maryland. He can share revenue projections from a more robust Maryland economy that could eliminate, minimize, or delay a need for future tax and/or fee increases.

Last but not least, he can remind the House Democratic leadership that after eight years of Progressive Democratic Governor Martin O’Malley and Democratic supermajorities approving  a wide range of tax and fee increases, Republican Larry Hogan was elected twice as governor and now has an opportunity to be the first Republican to be elected to the U.S. Senate from Maryland since 1968.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

 

Last November, progressives in Maryland were thrilled when Democratic candidate Wes Moore was elected governor in a landslide after defeating nine much more well-known opponents in a Democratic primary. They were even more thrilled when progressive Democratic candidates were elected to replace moderate Democratic members and Republican members in the Maryland House of Delegates and the Maryland Senate. Those elections further solidified the Democratic veto- proof supermajorities in both houses of the General Assembly.

Going into the 2014 General Assembly session, progressives seemed to be large and in charge. They looked forward to further advancing their progressive public policy agenda.

As the 90-day session begins to wind down, that has not been the case, especially on tax and budget matters. It is increasingly clear the Democratic supermajorities are not monolithic, nor is the Governor fully embracing an aggressive progressive tax and budget agenda.

This outcome was not expected when Governor Moore presented his proposed state budget in mid-January. Then there was consensus that a balanced state budget would be easily approved before or by the end of the session as required by the Maryland Constitution. 

Recently that consensus has been shaken to the core based on five consecutive revised State Board of Revenue Estimates projecting state budget deficits will be the largest since the “Great Recession” which began in December 2007 and ended in June 2009.

Next fiscal year, the deficit is projected to reach $1 billion. In fiscal year 2027, the last year of Governor Moore’s first term, it is projected to grow to $1.3 billion. A year later, it is projected to more than double to $3 billion and could be $4 billion the following fiscal year. These projections do not include the impact of funding to address a $ 3.1 billion deficit in the state Transportation Trust Fund and $8 billion to fully implement the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future (The Kirwan Report). 

As a result, there has been intense and even contentious debate in the Democratic supermajorities on what to do and when to do it. The answer depends on who you ask and where they sit. 

The Democratic House majority leader, Democratic chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, and the Democratic chair of the House Appropriations Committee, are united in saying the General Assembly needs to raise taxes and needs to raise them now. The Democratic senate president and Democratic chair of the Senate Budget and Taxation Committee are saying not so fast, we do not need to raise taxes in this session.

Governor Moore agrees with the Senate leader’s position there is no need for tax increases for now. Asked if that position would hold beyond the current year, Moore has said “I just know that the bar for raising taxes not just this year, but for every single year for me, it’s going to be a very high bar.” His budget secretary has elaborated on Moore’s overall strategy on budgets and taxes going forward by saying “These revenue trends continue to underscore the necessity of taking bold steps to improve our economy, create jobs and bring new businesses and population to Maryland.”  

No doubt the Moore administration is aware of the results when Maryland Democratic General Assembly supermajorities approved a wide range of tax and fee increases proposed by progressive Democratic Governor Martin O’Malley. With a “Change Maryland” message that resonated with Republican, Democratic, and unaffiliated voters, Republican Larry Hogan won two terms as governor and now has an opportunity to be elected to the U.S. Senate.

As is almost always the case In Maryland, final decisions over increasing state spending and increasing state taxes and fees will come down to how much and when? 

The larger question is how Democratic Party control of the state government will be impacted if the current divide between the shrinking moderate wing of the party and the growing progressive wing of the party on budget and tax matters is not resolved.

One unforeseen obstacle to resolving this divide are comments made recently by one high profile progressive Democratic county executive and agreed to by another.

Anne Arundel County Executive Steuart Pittman said the failure of long-standing progressive “tax reform” goals to gain support in the General Assembly is because “Loopholes are everywhere for interests that lobby for loopholes. It’s baked into the system. Legislators survive on a diet of campaign contributions to get into office and to stay there. The largest donors tend to be the very interests lobbying for loopholes and opposing a fair distribution of the tax burden.” Montgomery County Executive Marc Elrich agreed with that observation.

Such remarks are not going to help advance progressive positions in the General Assembly even when their party has supermajorities.

Given all the above, one can ask if the dynamics in the state legislature may be open to real change. What if Republican members who are accustomed to being largely irrelevant on budget and tax matters in Annapolis, forge a working relationship with moderate Democratic members on issues of common interest such as spending and taxes? 

Likely? No. Probable? No. Possible? Maybe. 

In politics anything is possible. Ask Larry Hogan and Wes Moore. I suspect both were told early on when they launched their gubernatorial campaigns that winning was not possible.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

In every election cycle, there are political pundits who use their position on media outlets as a bully pulpit to share their opinions. One of them is Claire McCaskill, a “political analyst” for MSNBC.

Prior to joining MSNBC, McCaskill was a career politician and United States Senator from Missouri who lost her reelection bid in 2018. After accepting her new role at MSNBC, McCaskill said she would “not hold back.” 

She could have also said but chose not to say – In my new role, I will not forget losing my senate race to a candidate endorsed by Donald Trump.

That was confirmed by her comments last week in an appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe. During her appearance, McCaskill had an epic on-air meltdown over a fact-checking article on Joe Biden in The New York Times.

The article’s headline was “Fact-Checking Biden’s Recent Economic Talking Points.” In the article, The Time’s reporters concluded some of Biden’s statements were either lacking context, misleading, or outright false.

In reacting to the story, McCaskill said “Can I make a suggestion? I move that every newspaper in America quits doing any fact-checks on Joe Biden until they fact-check Donald Trump every morning on the front page. It is ridiculous that The New York Times fact-checked Joe Biden on something. I mean, he vomits lies, Trump vomits lies. Every day, over and over and over again.”  She went on to say, “And it’s just ridiculous that the New York Times is doing a fact-check on Biden, while they let Trump, like they’re numb to the torrent of lies coming out of Trump’s mouth.”  

In her rant, McCaskill never refuted the conclusions in the Times article.

Regarding fact-checking fairness, McCaskill needs to recognize three facts that she is either unaware of or unwilling to acknowledge.

Fact #1 – Her claim that Donald Trump has not been routinely subjected to rigorous fact-checking is simply not true.

PolitiFact, a nonpartisan fact-checking website launched by the Tampa Bay Times, and now owned by The Poynter Institute (a nonprofit learning center for journalists), has regularly tracked Trump campaigns and White House years. 

Their website notes that Trump has been fact-checked thousands of times by different news organizations since he entered politics. 

After Trump, the three most-fact-checked politicians were former President Obama with 603 fact-checks, 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton with 301 fact-checks, and President Biden with 286 fact checks.

Progressive national media outlets like the New York Times and Washington Post are not cheerleaders or apologists for Trump.  

Fact #2 — On their website PolitiFact reports “The Washington Post’s Fact-checker column sought to collect every statement by Trump during his one term as president. They ended up with 30,753 items.

Fact #3 — New York Times Publisher A.G. Sulzberger responded to McCaskill’s attack by acknowledging the White House has been “extremely upset” over its coverage of Biden. He then said, “We are just stating the truth fully and plainly, but we are also doing that in a way that is unemotional. We are not anyone’s opposition and we’re not anyone’s lap dog.” 

In her tirade, Clair McCaskill asked, “May I make a motion?” Without waiting for an answer, she plowed ahead with her suggestion that “every newspaper in America quit doing any fact-checks on Joe Biden until they fact-check Donald Trump every morning on the front page.”

I have a motion too. I suggest every America ignore self-absorbed talking head pundits who are often wrong but never in doubt. This is especially the case with former elected and appointed politicians desperately trying to be important and relevant without interest in or capability of vetting their opinions.

Voters are best served with knowledgeable researchers’ fact-checking every candidate, elected official, and high-level appointed official without regard to their party affiliation or issue positions. Voters are also best served with knowledgeable journalists choosing the best media outlets to share the fact-checking results. 

That is what the voting public needs and deserves.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

Recently, multiple media outlets reported the Biden administration may revise a previously announced schedule on mandated new limits on emissions from vehicles using fossil fuels.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) projected these new limits would lead to 67% of new cars and light-duty truck sales being all-electric by 2032, an enormous increase given current sales of 7.6% in 2023.

Recent news from Ford makes that increase projection appear even more enormous. Last month, Ford announced they are reducing production of the F-150 Lightning all-electric pickup truck from the previously planned production rate of 3,200 per week to about 1,600 per week based on soft demand for EVs in the U.S. auto market.

The current emission mandate schedule has been strongly opposed by the United Auto Workers union, by manufacturers of about 97% of the new vehicles sold in the United States, and by 4000 new car dealerships across the country.

A new version is on its way. One may ask why and why now?

The sub headline in a recent New York Times article says it all.

“The change to planned rules was an election-year concession to labor unions and auto executives, according to people familiar with the plan.”

This is not surprising.  Opposition to and political consequences of maintaining the current schedule has been noticed by the Biden re-election campaign.

Labor support has long been a key element of an enduring political coalition used most effectively by the Democratic Party, in national elections and especially so especially in vote rich blue states.

That labor support for Biden was first put to a test last year when the EPA initially proposed the new emission level schedules.

The Biden re-election campaign got a shot across the bow then. The president of the United Auto Workers Union announced the UAW was withholding its endorsement of Biden’s re-election bid citing their concerns with the aggressive schedule for a transition to all electric vehicles.

In public comments, that the UAW filed regarding the proposed rule, they pressed the Biden administration to relax the compliance timeline. In discussions with senior White House officials, they repeated that request. Following those discussions Biden administration officials said the union’s comments had “resonated.”

Beyond the threat of the UAW to withhold an endorsement, other comments that likely resonated with the Biden reelection campaign was an observation by University of Michigan political science professor Barry Rabe.

Speaking on Michigan politics and Donald Trump, Rabe said, “Mr. Trump has focused on the anxiety over electric vehicles that pervades that auto-making state, one of a handful of swing states where the election is likely to be decided. Whenever he [Trump] comes to the state, this comes up. And this is not abstract in Michigan, it’s a real question.”

By early January of this year, the EPA sent a revised version of its auto emissions limits to the White House. It included the longer time frame requested by the UAW.

Weeks later, the United Auto Workers endorsed Biden.

Historically the UAW has been a major political force in Michigan. Despite a diminished membership, their endorsement will help them in energizing and mobilizing their members in get out the vote initiatives for Biden in November.

If that happens, it will further affirm that the Biden administration has ramped up a “pedal to the metal” campaign mode regarding public policy issues that impact voters in a handful of key battleground states such as Michigan.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

Larry Hogan’s recently announced U.S. Senate campaign is off to a good start.

Shortly after his announcement, a survey conducted by Emerson College Polling, The Hill and DC News Now showed Hogan tied with one possible strong Democratic opponent (David Trone), with 42% supporting each in a general election matchup and 16% undecided. The survey also showed Hogan leads in a general election matchup with another possible strong Democratic candidate (Angela Alsobrooks) 44% to 37%, with 19% undecided. The Republican primary survey results showed Hogan at 43%, undecided at 43%, and none of the other candidates at more than 9%. All the survey results have a 3% +.– margin of error.

Recently, one conservative candidate from Anne Arundel County withdrew from the Republican primary and endorsed Hogan.

In Larry Sabato’s widely read and influential Political Crystal Ball, J. Miles Coleman wrote, “In response to Hogan’s announcement, we downgraded our rating for Maryland from Safe Democratic to Likely Democratic.” That news will energize and mobilize donors who had previously viewed a Democratic win as a given.

Going forward, Hogan still faces at least three obstacles. All are formidable but none are insurmountable.

The first obstacle is Robin Ficker in the Republican primary. Ficker is aggressively appealing to Republican primary voters who may still be angry over some of Hogan’s actions while serving as governor. Those actions include Hogan’s unwavering support for covid lockdown mandates, moderate governing style, criticisms of Donald Trump and Trump supporters, and his refusal to support Dan Cox for governor after Cox defeated Hogan’s endorsed candidate to succeed him in a GOP primary.

To conservative Republican primary voters considering Ficker, Hogan can remind them of a guiding principle of conservative icon William F. Buckley and often repeated by conservative icon Ronald Reagan — support the most conservative candidate … who can win.

The second obstacle is the Democratic candidate for November ramping up a messaging blitz (already launched by Trone and Alsobrooks) that was highly effective in the last midterm elections. That message is all Republican candidates are a grave threat to abortion rights, and all are aligned with Donald Trump.

To all voters with concerns over the future of abortion rights, Hogan can remind them he is on record saying that as a senator, he will not vote for a national abortion ban. He can also tell them he will respect the outcome of a statewide referendum in Maryland on an amendment adding the right to an abortion to the state constitution.

The third obstacle is all of Hogan’s opponents in the primary and general elections, reminding voters about all the reasons Hogan gave when he was strongly encouraged but declined to run against incumbent U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen.

To all voters concerned about those reasons, Hogan can remind them the public record includes the reasons why he is running now. In reviewing that record it is clear Hogan mentioned “I said I wasn’t going to walk away from politics, I was going to try to be a voice, standing up to try to fix things, and you can’t just sit back and complain about things if you’re not willing to try to make a difference.”

Hogan can say his willingness “to try to make a difference” reflects his acceptance of the call to action in Teddy Roosevelt’s Man in the Arena speech –

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

It will be most interesting to see what Larry Hogan’s 2024 campaign strategy and messages will be.

More interesting will be if his messages in this election cycle will resonate with a majority of Maryland voters just as his Change Maryland message did when he was elected governor.

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.

Last week’s announcement by former Governor Larry Hogan that he is running to succeed retiring U.S. Senator Ben Cardin triggered immediate and widespread speculation on if he will be the first Maryland Republican to be elected to the Senate since 1980.

Larry Sabato veteran political observer at the University of Virginia has shown caution in his reaction to this news.

For now, Sabato has shifted his rating on the race to replace Cardin from Safe Democratic to Likely Democratic.

He has done so assuming Larry Hogan will be the Republican nominee.

This is a good assumption, but not a given.

Currently there are currently six other Republicans who have filed for the nomination with the state board of elections for the spring Republican primary election.

Conventional political wisdom is Hogan will be the Republican nominee.

Now more than ever conventional wisdom in the political world has been turned upside down and sideways.

The political world is now a VUCA world, one characterized by high and increasing levels of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity.

Recall the conventional wisdom when Larry Hogan announced his first campaign for governor.

Conventional wisdom then was no Republican could win statewide in deep blue Maryland.

Undaunted and with a memorable message that resonated deeply with Maryland voters –“Change Maryland” — Larry Hogan went on to defeat the incumbent Lieutenant Governor and then was reelected to a second term.

Conventional wisdom was wrong.

After eight years of years of Hogan serving as governor, conventional wisdom was that Kelly Schulz would be the Republican nominee to succeed Hogan.

Schulz was a former Republican member in the Maryland House of Delegates, a former Hogan cabinet secretary for two departments – the Department of Labor, Licensing, and Regulation, and the Department of Commerce, and was endorsed by Governor Hogan.

Conventional wisdom was Kelly could be branded as best person to continue Governor Hogan’s governing philosophy and style that resulted in extraordinarily high job performance rating during his two terms.

Former Maryland House of Delegates member Dan Cox opposed her in the primary.

Cox’s frustration with Hogan’s policies (especially his aggressive public lock down policies on Covid control) and Hogan’s moderate approach to governing led to a decision by Cox to introduce a House resolution to impeach Hogan.

While that resolution went nowhere in the House of Delegates, it energized and mobilized enough Republican primary voters who shared Cox’s frustration with Hogan to propel Cox to winning the GOP gubernatorial nomination.

Conventional wisdom was wrong again.

In a VUCA political world there is no question that Larry Hogan is a gifted politician who twice proved conventional wisdom wrong.

There is also no question he is a politician whose decision to pursue a run for the U.S. Senate reflects thinking that fortune favors the bold.

The question to be determined is will his bold move in increasingly blue Maryland result in his election to the U.S Senate and perhaps beyond or be recorded in his biography as a noble but impossible goal.

Stand by.

As they often say in the TV news world — “stay tuned as this is a developing story.”

David Reel is a public affairs and public relations consultant who lives in Easton.