In its anxiety to be seen doing something good, the Maryland General Assembly has managed to do something gravely disfiguring. What began as a noble effort to deliver long-overdue justice to survivors of institutional child sexual abuse has now become a cautionary tale in legislative vanity — a textbook example of what happens when lawmakers legislate emotion unmoored from economics.

I refer to the 2023 Child Victims Act, Maryland’s morally urgent and fiscally negligent decision to lift the statute of limitations for abuse claims. The law, passed with great fanfare and a flood of self-congratulation, created what Maryland Matters reporter Bryan P. Sears has since documented as a staggering wave of lawsuits — thousands of them — aimed not just at religious institutions, but at the State of Maryland itself.

The cost? Sears reports that conservative estimates place potential state liability around $4 billion, a figure that rivals Maryland’s already cavernous structural deficit. And the real number may be even higher. Attorneys representing survivors say they’re handling claims from over 4,500 clients — with hundreds, perhaps thousands, more expected.

And yet — stunningly — the Legislature provided no mechanism to pay for this moral reckoning. No appropriated fund. No revenue stream. No reserve. No roadmap. Just a massive, undisciplined release of legal liability, issued in a fit of legislative conscience, with the bill to be settled by future taxpayers.

Now, in a moment of panicked pragmatism, the General Assembly has passed House Bill 1378, which slashes damage caps and narrows victims’ rights before the fiscal hemorrhage becomes uncontrollable. Governor Wes Moore has said he will sign it, noting the need to “preserve the long-term fiscal stability of the state.” As if this consideration — curiously absent when the law was first passed — had only recently presented itself.

Sears, who has provided indispensable coverage of this evolving crisis, noted that attorneys for victims are now racing to file lawsuits before the new, reduced caps take effect on June 1. Robert K. Jenner, one of those attorneys, called the new law a betrayal of the survivors Maryland had once promised to support. “It breaks the faith,” Jenner said, with “thousands of survivors who believed the state was on their side.”

Indeed it does. The state extended its hand to victims and invited them to come forward — and now, discovering that it may have bankrupted its conscience, it is pulling that helping hand back.

Delegate C.T. Wilson, who sponsored both the original law and its subsequent limitation on damages compensation, expressed astonishment at the number of claims. “I could have never comprehended 4,500 claimants,” he told Sears. That statement, dripping with sincerity, should chill every Maryland taxpayer. It is an admission that the General Assembly created a multi-billion-dollar liability without the faintest grasp of its scope.

Meanwhile, it is not clear if the Wall Street bond rating agencies have yet to be formally advised of the full dimensions of this contingent liability — a liability that, were it sitting on a corporate balance sheet, would invite charges of concealment. For a state that worships at the altar of its AAA bond rating, this alleged omission, if true, may prove the most reckless move of all.

This is what happens when symbolism replaces statesmanship. When feelings outrun facts. When the impulse to seem good overpowers the obligation to do good well.

Conservatives, it should be said, do not oppose justice for victims. But they insist on justice that is honest, deliverable, and rooted in prudence. What Maryland has offered instead is a promissory note with no plan to pay — and is now scrambling to shrink the obligation before the ink is even dry. This is the soft tyranny of good intentions unanchored by practical reasoning.   Here, the soft tyranny has become a hard liability — and a bruising one for Maryland taxpayers.

Maryland made a promise. It failed to count the cost. And now, in full view of the victims it once embraced, it is preparing to default — not in legal terms, perhaps, but in moral ones. What began as an act of courage now ends in retreat, with justice rationed and accountability nowhere in sight.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr. is a life-long Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals.  He is co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast that discusses politics, business, and cultural issues. 

It requires a certain species of hubris—rare even among the bureaucratic classes of Annapolis—to imagine that the State of Maryland, which struggles to teach its children to read and fill its potholes on time, is uniquely equipped to rehabilitate a century-old horse racing track and somehow turn it into an economic engine. And yet, here we are: the state has already embarked on a taxpayer-funded effort to revamp the Pimlico Racecourse, sinking public resources into a fading relic in the hope of reviving its former glory.

But that horse has left the barn.

The question now is not whether the state should redevelop Pimlico—it already in progress. The more pressing question, in light of Maryland’s looming multi-billion-dollar structural deficit, is whether the state should continue this quixotic endeavor. The answer is no. It’s time to cut bait, sell the project to a private developer, and let those with the vision, capital, and market discipline to succeed take over.

Let us speak plainly. Horse racing, once the “Sport of Kings,” is now the sport of a niche. The crowds have dwindled, the betting pools have migrated to digital bookmakers, and the cultural cachet of thoroughbred racing, outside of the brief flurry of the Triple Crown, has evaporated like cigar smoke in a stiff breeze. The average Marylander has as much connection to horse racing as he does to the sport of curling, and with considerably less interest. It no longer serves as a public good. It is, at best, a private indulgence.

And yet, the state persists in its delusion that it can restore Pimlico to its former 20th-century glory—not through market forces, but through force of public finance. This is not stewardship. This is a bailout, clothed in the language of tradition and civic pride.

Even if one were to indulge the fiction that Pimlico retains some cultural value to Marylanders at large, one must confront an even more inconvenient truth: it serves virtually no benefit to the people who live around it. The citizens of Baltimore—particularly those in the long-neglected Park Heights neighborhood—do not need horse racing. They do not derive employment from it, nor entertainment, nor any sustained civic benefit. They see, instead, a vast parcel of city land used for a handful of days each year, sealed off the rest of the time, insulated from community needs, and animated chiefly by people who come and go like the horses themselves.

This is not just a poor use of taxpayer dollars. It is a poor use of urban space.

Imagine instead a development vision that actually addressed the public interest: mixed-income housing, green space, athletic fields, small business incubators, medical clinics, cultural venues, and relatable events for the community—not for a roving national set of socialites and bettors. Pimlico, properly reimagined, could become a civic anchor. As it stands, it is an anchor in the more nautical sense: a drag on the city’s forward motion, held in place by the weight of nostalgia and the rope of political inertia.

Meanwhile, we are told that the Preakness generates economic activity. Yes, a burst of temporary revenue. But who profits? Not the local residents. Not the struggling businesses of Park Heights. The primary beneficiaries are the racing industry, visiting elites, and the various vendors who circle the event like camp followers at a traveling circus. That is not economic development. That is pageantry.

And then there is the matter of Maryland’s fiscal reality. The state faces a structural deficit projected to materially worsen over the next five years. Annapolis officials, with straight faces and open palms, are already hinting at the inevitability of new taxes to sustain basic government operations. In such an environment, a $400,000,000 public expenditure on a racetrack is not merely extravagant—it is fiscally grotesque.

Consider what that $400 million could do instead: repair dozens of crumbling schools in Baltimore City; expand broadband access across the rural Eastern Shore and Western Maryland; replenish the state’s depleted transportation trust fund; or invest in behavioral health infrastructure to address the fentanyl crisis. That would be public investment. That would be need-based budgeting. The Pimlico Racetrack project is vanity spending masquerading as vision.

It is the classic conceit of government to believe that because it can spend, it can manage. Running a racetrack is not the business of the state. Managing any enterprise involving marketing, real estate, event production, and private capital is precisely what the state has repeatedly demonstrated it cannot do. A legislature cannot horse-trade its way to a successful business model—though goodness knows it tries.

Let us suppose, for argument’s sake, that horse racing in Baltimore has a future. Let that future be built not by the Annapolis bureaucracy but by private actors who understand the sport and are willing to risk their own capital to see it succeed. A re-privatized Pimlico would live or die on its merits. And if it dies? So be it. That is the wager private enterprise is designed to make. The Preakness can be held at another racetrack.

The state has already done what the government does best: write checks. Now it should do what it rarely has the courage to do—walk away. Sell the property, transfer the risk, and let the market decide Pimlico’s fate. The people of Park Heights—and the taxpayers of Maryland—deserve more than a ceremonial money pit occasionally dressed up in seersucker and mint juleps.

Enough with the politics of nostalgia. Enough with the costly fantasy that government can do what markets will not. If Pimlico is to run again, let it run without taxpayer involvement.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr. is a life-long Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals.  He is co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast that discusses politics, business, and cultural issues. 

In recent months, with increasing Annapolis-imposed taxes and control over farmland for solar power generation, the call for Maryland’s Eastern Shore to secede from the rest of the state has gained some momentum, especially on social media. Proponents argue that the region’s distinct political, cultural, and economic differences with the more urbanized areas of Maryland make separation an attractive prospect. However, while the notion of secession may sound appealing to some, it is fraught with legal complexities, economic realities, and political barriers that make it highly unlikely, if not a waste of time.

Historically, the Eastern Shore has indeed had a unique identity. Its culture is rooted in Southern traditions, a vestige of Maryland’s once-Southern character, distinct from the more Northeastern influences that have shaped the Western Shore’s metropolitan areas. This divergence has often fueled talk of secession, harkening back to 1833 when a proposal to integrate the Eastern Shore into Delaware narrowly failed in the Maryland Senate. 

As recently as 1998, legendary Eastern Shore legislator Richard F. Colburn revived the idea of a referendum to allow the Shore to secede and possibly form a new state, “Delmarva.” While these initiatives generated some headlines, they have never come to fruition, and it’s unlikely they ever will.

My fellow Shoremen, to secede from Maryland and either join another state or form a new one, the Eastern Shore would have to navigate a series of legal challenges that make this pursuit appear more fantasy than feasible. The U.S. Constitution makes clear that no new state can be created from the territory of an existing state without the approval of both the state legislature and Congress (Article IV, Section 3). This means that even if Maryland’s General Assembly approved such a move, Congress would also have to approve the formation of a new state—a process fraught with political wrangling and uncertainty.

Beyond the legislative approval, the U.S. Supreme Court has already ruled on secession in the aftermath of the Civil War. In the 1869 case Texas v. White, the Court declared that secession was unconstitutional, reinforcing the idea that no state, or part of a state, can unilaterally break away from the Union. Legal challenges are virtually certain if the Eastern Shore were to pursue secession, and it’s highly probable that the courts would not favor this movement.

Even if the legal hurdles could somehow be overcome, the economic implications of secession would be dire. The Eastern Shore relies heavily on state and federal funding for everything from infrastructure to education and social services. If the region were to sever ties with Maryland, it would be responsible for managing its own services and public goods—an enormous financial burden for a region that, while rich in natural beauty and agriculture, does not have the same economic resources as the state’s larger urban areas.

Moreover, Maryland’s Eastern Shore is not a standalone economic powerhouse. It benefits from its connections to the state, particularly in areas such as agriculture, tourism, and fisheries. If the Shore were to become independent or align with another state, it could lose access to state funding, federal grants, and critical partnerships that support its economy. While some proponents of secession envision creating a self-sustaining, independent state, this vision fails to account for the financial realities of managing an entire state without the support structures Maryland currently provides.

Perhaps the greatest obstacle to secession, however, is political. The Eastern Shore, with a population of roughly 600,000 people, represents a small fraction of Maryland’s total population. The state’s urban centers, particularly in Baltimore and the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area, hold much more political influence. Any proposal for secession would face immense opposition from lawmakers representing these more populous areas, who would be reluctant to relinquish valuable territory and resources.

In addition, the broader Maryland electorate would likely resist such a move. While the Eastern Shore’s residents may feel disconnected from the state’s urban centers, the rest of Maryland has its own interests to protect, and the separation of the Shore would cause significant disruption to the state’s economic and political systems. It is hard to imagine that enough support could be mustered, either in the state legislature or among voters, to approve such a drastic change.

Instead of pursuing a doomed effort to secede, the Eastern Shore could explore more practical solutions for achieving greater political and economic autonomy. One possibility would be to push for a form of regional governance that grants the Shore greater control over its own affairs without the need for full secession. This could involve expanded home rule powers, similar to those held by larger counties like Montgomery or Prince George’s, which would allow the Eastern Shore to make more decisions locally, such as on zoning, taxation, and infrastructure.

Another potential path could be the creation of an “Enterprise Zone” for the Shore, which would offer tax incentives and regulatory flexibility to boost local businesses. This approach could foster economic growth without the significant disruptions and legal battles associated with secession.

In the end, while the idea of Eastern Shore secession may reflect a sense of political and cultural frustration, the practical reality is that it is highly unlikely to succeed. The legal, economic, and political obstacles are simply too great to overcome. 

Rather than pursuing an unattainable and unrealistic dream of independence, the Eastern Shore should focus on more feasible ways to increase its autonomy and influence within Maryland. Attempts at secession are, at best, a distraction, and at worst, a foolish folly that will only serve to divide the region from the rest of the state without offering any tangible benefits.

 

There is nothing noble about state officials stripping rural counties of their land use authority in the name of green climate policy and placing a heavy boot on the farming communities’ neck. In Maryland, the script is being written by urban Democrats who have never held a seed in their hand or watched a storm roll across a field with the worry of a yield hanging in the balance. Their latest affront is a legislative land grab cloaked in green virtue: the pre-emption of local zoning laws to ram through utility-scale solar farms, directed not by elected county governments, but by the unelected and unaccountable Maryland Public Service Commission.

This, dear reader, is not policy – it is plunder.

In the song “Where Corn Don’t Grow,” Waylon Jennings warned us about the mirage of easy progress, where the “weeds are high where corn don’t grow.” In Maryland, we are sowing weeds indeed. 

Urban legislators, intoxicated by climate platitudes and federal subsidies, have decided that Maryland’s breadbasket—the Eastern Shore—must become their energy pantry. Our farmland, cultivated through generations of grit and stewardship, is now being commodified by climate czars and solar salesmen with hundreds of millions to spend, aided and abetted by none other than Senate President Bill Ferguson, who moonlights—as luck would have it—as legal counsel for a solar company.

Scandalous? Only if you still believe Annapolis is anything but a racket.

Let us not beat about the bush. This is a systematic undermining of local control by urban politicians who believe virtue-signaling from a rowhouse stoop in Baltimore entitles them to dictate land use on the Eastern Shore. 

House Bill 1036 and Senate Bill 931 are nothing short of a war declaration against rural Maryland. Under these bills, the Public Service Commission—an entity whose members earn over $207,000 per year and answer only to the Governor at the end of their terms—has been legislatively given carte blanche to preempt county zoning, effectively deciding where solar arrays may sprout like so many metallic weeds.  

The urban progressives claim they need 18,000 to 30,000 acres for solar. But they’ve seized the authority to control far more—5% of all Priority Preservation Area farmland, which in Caroline County alone equals 8,800 acres. Across the Shore? Tens of thousands of acres. 

Meanwhile, a state bill to prohibit solar eminent domain was not only killed—it was opposed by the Maryland Energy Administration. The solar energy companies are offering seductively obscene high prices for leasing farmland – amounts that farmers will find hard to refuse and with no fear that local county governments can enforce their zoning laws or comprehensive plans.  

Connect the dots.  This is neither a compromise nor true freedom of choice. This is conquest.

What makes this all the more galling is that these solar fields are not even efficient. As I have stated in a prior article, “Maryland is not green; Maryland is irresponsible”. We’re racing to meet abstract arbitrary climate benchmarks, gutting food-producing land in the process, while refusing to require that solar installations first cover impervious surfaces, parking lots, rooftops, and brownfields—the very spaces urban Maryland controls in abundance. Why? Because it’s easier—and more profitable—to dump solar arrays in Dorchester County than in downtown Baltimore or Silver Spring.

The urban progressives lecture us rural Marylanders about climate justice while quietly dismantling the foundation of food security. One 216-acre solar project in Millington (a town in Kent County for those of you in the urban areas that have no idea about the real Eastern Shore) has already taken 2 million pounds of corn and over a million pounds of wheat and soybeans off the market. Multiply that by 25. Then by nine counties. This is not environmentalism – it is scorched-earth policy wrapped in silicon.

And who is at the center of it all? One such person is Senate President Bill Ferguson. But his fingerprints are all over more than just land policy.

Ferguson has made a habit of advancing legislation that creates a crisis and then proposing government-funded solutions that deepen it. His support for a law allowing utility companies to lock in multi-year rate plans has helped drive a wave of energy price hikes now hitting working families across the state. Households already struggling under inflation are now facing punishing power bills—with little relief in sight.

Instead of reversing course, Ferguson is championing the use of taxpayer funds to send out “rebate checks” to help cover these rising utility costs. But these are the very costs his policy helped create. And the money for those checks? It’s coming straight from a state’s taxpayer funded budget that’s already hemorrhaging money.

Maryland is facing a staggering $3.3 billion budget shortfall. Federal aid that was once promised—such as the $418 million intended for education—has been yanked back, leaving school systems in disarray. Temporary pandemic funding has dried up, and the positions it once paid for—teachers, mental health professionals, construction workers—are vanishing. The state is now scrambling to paper over holes it helped permanently punch into the fiscal wall.

This isn’t crisis management. It’s a cycle of dysfunction dressed up as public service.

And Ferguson isn’t alone. Delegate Brian Crosby played a role in enabling these utility rate hikes, while Delegate CT Wilson has routinely backed legislation that weakens transparency and circumvents local accountability. They are not governing—they are insulating themselves from the consequences of their own votes, all while feeding the narrative that they are “fixing” what they have broken.

Caroline County Commissioner Larry Porter said it plainly in a recent social media post: “If only 2% of farmland is needed, why take 5%?” Why would Annapolis progressives gut our preservation programs and preempt local zoning ordinances for solar developers? Why override rural voices? The answer: Because they can… and because they believe us “hayseeds” on the Shore will not notice.

But we do notice. We are from the Eastern Shore, but we are not stupid.  We know more than we say, think more than we speak, and notice more than the urban progressives realize. We see how the very people engineering the budget crisis are now asking for applause because they offer momentary relief. We see how Annapolis insiders treat the Eastern Shore not as a region of equal citizens, but as an extraction zone for urban fantasies.

Jay Falstad, the Executive Director of the Queen Anne’s Conservation Association, in a recent social media post, put it best: “Solar panels are not agriculture, and they do not belong on agricultural land.” This is not rural resistance. This is common sense.

And where is Governor Wes Moore in all this?  Silent – as usual – above the fray and unwilling to offend the powerful. But the people of Maryland are paying the high price—for their power bills, their classrooms, and their property.

Let’s be very clear: the budget crisis is not just an abstract number. It’s affecting our schools, our energy bills, and our state’s fiscal credibility. The same insiders who caused the crisis now want to be seen as saviors. And unless Maryland voters demand a reckoning, this cycle of ruin will continue.

Speaking of fiscal credibility, I wonder if the Wall Street bond rating agencies know about the State’s unfunded liability of the many brewing Maryland detention abuse cases.  This looming liability will be measured in billions of dollars and is something I bet was not disclosed to Wall Street.  But do not pay attention to this my Eastern Shore readers, for the progressive urbanites are telling us, “All is well and there is nothing to see here”.  I bet you that due to this progressive government’s malpractice, Maryland’s bond rating will be downgraded, and within 12 months your taxes will be further upgraded.  

Just like the “green agenda” energy crisis, this is another expensive problem created by the progressive Democrat supermajority and the silent sidelined Governor.  Who doubts me?

Because “where corn don’t grow”, weeds take root. Weeds like cronyism, cynicism, and centralized power.

And if Maryland keeps letting urban bureaucrats decide what grows on its farmland—both literally and politically—then the next thing to die will not be crops.  It’ll be the Eastern Shore’s local freedoms.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr. is a life-long Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals.  He is co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast that discusses politics, business, and cultural issues. 

 

One of my more inquisitive readers recently posed a question in the comments section, dripping with the sort of presumption that so often accompanies political discourse: “Can’t help wondering how Mr. Mitchell would propose to solve the $3 billion structural deficit that actually accrued under former Governor Hogan’s leadership?” I am, of course, compelled to reject the premise. Governor Hogan did not bequeath a deficit but rather departed Annapolis leaving behind a $5 billion surplus—a fact so indisputable that even Governor Moore, upon assuming office in January 2023, acknowledged Maryland’s “fortunate” financial standing. That this fiscal windfall has since deteriorated into crisis is a testament not to Hogan’s stewardship, but to the profligacy of those who followed.

If I was to write a full response on how I would propose to solve the $3 billion deficit, it would consume many hundreds of pages.  Instead, I shall offer just a few examples:

There is, to put it bluntly, something profoundly disturbing about a government so enamored with its own bureaucratic sprawl that it cannot so much as glance at its own expenditures without encountering redundancies thick enough to blot out the very sun of fiscal prudence. Maryland, the Old Line State, has become the Overlapping Line State, where agencies duplicate the functions of other agencies, where tax dollars hemorrhage in the service of inefficiency, and where reform is spoken of wistfully but never enacted. This condition is neither natural nor necessary. It is the predictable consequence of a government whose appetite for expansion exceeds its capacity for discipline.

One needs only to examine Maryland’s workforce development programs to appreciate the wastefulness of the current system. Here we have the Maryland Department of Labor overseeing job training, while the Maryland Department of Commerce, for reasons known only to the bureaucratic mind, also administers its own workforce grants. As if that were insufficient, the Maryland Higher Education Commission and local workforce boards run parallel efforts, their mandates overlapping like poorly laid shingles on an already leaking roof. 

The result? Administrative redundancy, programmatic inefficiency, and, worst of all, a workforce no better prepared than if a single competent entity had overseen the effort.

But let us not stop there. Consider the confounding patchwork of Maryland’s economic development initiatives, where no fewer than three separate entities—the Maryland Department of Commerce, TEDCO, and a constellation of county development offices—each claim to be the indispensable engine of business growth. Yet, despite their myriad grants, incentives, and tax credits, one struggles to discern a clear, unified strategy. Instead, what emerges is a bureaucratic hydra, each head snapping at the same objectives with little regard for coordination, let alone efficiency.

The absurdity extends to public safety, where law enforcement agencies multiply like rabbits under a full moon. Maryland State Police patrol the highways while the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) Police patrol the railways—both under state authority yet functioning as distinct entities. Meanwhile, the Natural Resources Police conduct enforcement that, in many instances, overlaps with existing state and local law enforcement efforts. To the bureaucrat, this fragmentation is a virtue—a testament to the government’s commitment to public safety. To the taxpayer, it is an unmitigated scam, a fiscal sinkhole in which precious resources are lost in the abyss of administrative fiefdoms.

Health and social services are no better. Marylanders must navigate an array of agencies—the Maryland Department of Health, the Department of Human Services, and the Maryland Health Benefit Exchange—each overseeing different, yet eerily similar, programs. Medicaid, food assistance, and housing support are administered not through a streamlined and cohesive system, but through an obstacle course of redundant offices, each armed with its own budget and bureaucratic prerogatives. That this inefficiency persists in a state so heavily taxed is an affront to reason.

The same could be said of early childhood education, where MSDE, the Department of Human Services, and county-level agencies each assert dominion over pre-K and childcare subsidies. And yet, despite this bureaucratic overabundance, no one could seriously argue that Maryland’s educational outcomes justify the labyrinthine complexity. If anything, the confusion serves only to exacerbate inequality, as parents struggle to decipher which agency, which program, which level of government, will deliver the services their children need.

Beyond bureaucratic redundancy, Maryland is also burdened by a host of government-funded programs that would be far better suited for privatization or outright elimination. Consider Maryland Public Television (MPT) and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (BSO) – both entities that, while culturally valuable, should operate independently of state funding, sustained instead by private donations and sponsorships.

In particular, MPT is often defended on the grounds that it provides vital educational programming such as Sesame Street. Yet, this argument crumbles under scrutiny. Sesame Street is not a public service; it is a commercial enterprise. Sesame Workshop, the organization behind Sesame Street, generates enormous revenue through licensing and merchandising. 

In 2004, more than 68% of Sesame Street’s revenue came from toy and clothing sales. By 2005, licensing and international co-productions generated $96 million annually. Between 2008 and 2019, Sesame Street Muppets raked in $15 to $17 million per year in merchandising fees, with proceeds split between Sesame Workshop and The Jim Henson Company. In 2018, Sesame Workshop’s largest revenue source was royalties and distribution fees, totaling $52.9 million. This is not a struggling nonprofit in need of government assistance; this is a multimillion-dollar brand with extensive private sector backing.

Maryland taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize what is, in effect, a free advertisement for Sesame Street merchandise. If MPT provides value, let it prove so in the free market. There is no compelling reason why it cannot sustain itself through private sponsorships, viewer donations, and corporate underwriting, just as countless other media organizations do.

The same logic applies to the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (BSO). This is an organization that provides entertainment to an insular audience of citizens—a cultural function, not an essential public service. The BSO has received repeated taxpayer-funded bailouts despite its ability to generate revenue from ticket sales, private sponsorships, and philanthropy. 

Adding insult to injury, the salaries of BSO’s top executives further illustrate why public subsidies are unnecessary. For example, in 2021, the BSO’s President and CEO earned over $400,000 (more than the Governor), and other high-ranking executives commanded six-figure salaries. If the organization can afford to pay its leadership handsomely, it should also be able to figure out how to operate without dipping into the taxpayer’s pocket.

These are but a few examples of where Maryland could implement cost-cutting and privatization reforms. The opportunities do not end here. With new AI tools rapidly advancing, many ministerial duties currently performed by state employees could be automated. 

For instance, processing permits and licenses, a task that consumes countless hours of government labor, could be handled by AI-driven systems that review applications, check compliance, and issue approvals within minutes. Similarly, document classification and retrieval in legal and regulatory offices could be streamlined through AI-powered databases, eliminating the need for redundant clerical work and freeing up human resources for higher-value tasks.

These reforms, privatizations, and cost-cutting measures must be enacted before state leaders come back to the well in the 2026 Session, demanding more from Maryland taxpayers. The burden should not continually fall on citizens’ wallets when there is ample room for restructuring government operations to operate more efficiently and responsibly.

I have written before, in Fiscal Reform for Maryland, that the state’s budgetary trajectory is unsustainable. A government that fails to trim the fat will, in due course, find itself feasting on the substance of its people. Maryland must resist this course. What is needed is a top-down reorganization—one that consolidates workforce programs, eliminates redundant business incentives, streamlines law enforcement, and centralizes social services. The principles are simple: one agency per function, coordination instead of duplication, and efficiency over empire-building.  

Governor Marvin Mandel reformed and re-organized the state’s government over 50 years ago without the aid of computers or artificial intelligence and in an era where there were no departments and over sprawling 240 agencies.  Certainly, we can now reform state government, make efficiencies, and bring forth a working bureaucracy for the 21st century.

The time for half-measures has passed. If Maryland wishes to retain even a semblance of fiscal responsibility, it must rein in its bureaucratic excess. Let those who resist such reform be reminded: a government that exists to serve itself ceases to serve the people. And a government that ceases to serve the people is one that, sooner or later, the people will cease to support.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr., is a lifelong Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and the former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals. He is also the co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast, which discusses politics, business, and cultural issues. 

 

The moral imagination of Maryland’s governing class has suffered an embarrassing decline, leaving us with a legislature that has confused deception for discipline, cost shifting for cost cutting, and fiscal smoke and mirrors for sound governance. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the Budget Reconciliation and Financing Act (BRFA) of 2025, a piece of fiscal trickery that Governor Wes Moore and his allies in the legislature would like you to believe represents responsible budget trimming.

Thanks to the reporting by David M. Higgins, II, in the Southern Maryland Chronicle, we have a clearer picture of what is really transpiring in Annapolis. The state, staring down a staggering $3.3 billion shortfall, has opted for the path of least resistance: shifting financial burdens onto county governments while simultaneously engineering a tax grab that would make even the most committed Keynesian blush.

Maryland’s counties are being handed the privilege of plugging the state’s budget holes, courtesy of new unfunded mandates. The partial shift of teacher pension costs—initially proposed at $195.5 million but mercifully whittled down to $97.7 million—remains a significant encumbrance on counties that have no say in pension policy. Meanwhile, counties are now forced to pay 90% of the State Department of Assessments and Taxation’s (SDAT) $21.2 million annual cost, a program they do not control but upon which their property tax revenues depend. If there were a contest for the most cynical example of cost shifting, this might win it.

But wait… there’s more! Governor Moore and his legislative enablers have decided that counties should also foot half the bill for wrongful incarceration compensation settlements. This bill is measured in billions of dollars. 

It seems we have reached a point where the state can create obligations and then outsource the financial responsibility—an arrangement that would make any private-sector accountant recoil in horror.

As Higgins has reported, the Maryland Association of Counties (MACo) has rightly raised alarms over these fiscal acrobatics. Counties already contribute $1.4 billion more to public school funding than required under the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, a shortfall exacerbated by state underfunding of special education and student transportation. That the state continues to lean on counties to shoulder even greater burdens is an admission of its own budgetary incompetence.

For those in Annapolis, the word “cut” seems to have lost all meaning. This is not budgetary restraint—it is a calculated effort to offload expenses onto local governments while maintaining the illusion that state spending has been prudently managed. Governor Moore is not reducing the size of government; he is merely hiding its growth by pushing the bill elsewhere.

Of course, no discussion of the BRFA would be complete without acknowledging the latest assault on Maryland taxpayers. With surgical precision, the state has carved out new revenue streams, each more insidious than the last. The 6.25% income tax rate for earnings between $500,001 and $1 million, coupled with a 6.5% rate above $1 million, is expected to drain $344 million from the private sector. The 2% capital gains surcharge? Another $367 million extracted from investors and entrepreneurs. Then, there’s the 3% sales tax on data and IT services, set to pull in a staggering $497 million—because nothing says “business-friendly” like new taxes on innovation and technology.

But wait—there’s even more! Increased vehicle excise taxes, doubled titling fees, surging registration fees, and an escalating cannabis sales tax round out this exhaustive menu of revenue grabs. It is a tax-and-spend bonanza that would make even the most avowed redistributionist beam with pride.

The Annapolis progressive elites have attempted to sell this package as a balanced, thoughtful approach to governance. They tout their supposed budget cuts as evidence of prudence. Yet, as Higgins’ reporting makes clear, these are not cuts. These are liabilities dressed up as savings, costs shifted downward so that Annapolis can pretend to be fiscally responsible while counties are left to either raise property taxes or slash essential services.

In the end, this is a story as old as government itself: the state expands, the burden increases, and the citizens—whether directly or through their local governments—are left holding the bag. Governor Moore and his allies will no doubt continue their rhetorical tap dance, assuring Marylanders that they are the responsible stewards of taxpayer money. But make no mistake: what they have produced is not fiscal discipline. It is an exercise in obfuscation, a cleverly packaged con that attempts to disguise tax hikes and spending shifts as responsible governance.

One can only hope that Marylanders—particularly those at the county level—recognize the deception for what it is. The legislature may be able to shuffle costs around, but it cannot change the fundamental reality: state government has failed in its duty to live within its means, and it is the taxpayers who will ultimately pay the price.

But hey, at least Annapolis gets to pretend it’s fiscally responsible for another year.

 

In the shadowed corridors of Annapolis, where budget discussions echo like the whispers of palace intrigue, Governor Wes Moore remains conspicuously absent. While legislative leaders, hands wringing and brows furrowed, haggle over Maryland’s spiraling fiscal woes, the governor has chosen to divert his gaze to the distant horizons of national prominence. It is a curious thing: when Marylanders require leadership most, their governor appears more interested in cementing a political brand than in confronting the financial crisis unfolding under his watch.

Gary Collins, of WBFF FOX 45, has aptly chronicled Moore’s national escapades—whether it be the gilded Gridiron Dinner in Washington or a leisurely Sunday appearance on “Face the Nation.” These engagements may flatter his ambitions, but they do little to assuage the anxieties of Marylanders who see their tax burden poised for yet another precipitous climb. 

Collins has been particularly diligent in exposing the administration’s reluctance to engage with local media on pressing financial issues, highlighting Moore’s preference for national exposure over state-level accountability. And climb it will, regardless of the semantic pirouettes performed by legislative leaders. Whether labeled a “business-to-business tax” or a “sales tax on some services,” Marylanders will soon feel the cold hand of government extracting more from their pockets.

Senate President Bill Ferguson assures us that we are “very, very close” to a budget framework. But to what end? The process is taking longer than usual, deadlines have come and gone, and the only certainty is that the taxpayers will foot the bill for the incompetence of single-party rule. 

The deficit has metastasized from a surplus of $5 billion to a shortfall of $3.3 billion—an astonishing reversal in just a short period of time. The Senate Minority Leader, Steve Hershey, sees this predicament with clarity: Maryland’s overreliance on federal largesse has left it vulnerable to the slightest tremors in Washington. The pattern is undeniable: crisis, federal bailouts, and an utter refusal to heed the warnings of fiscal reality.

Yet Governor Moore, despite his repeated assertions that he is “working very closely” with lawmakers, has done little to clarify his stance on the tax proposals currently under discussion. As Collins reported, Moore has declared that a broad business-to-business tax is off the table, but only in the sense that it must be accompanied by a broader tax on consumers and individual taxpayers. This is the governing equivalent of promising to hit the taxpayer with a left hook rather than a right. 

One imagines the Maryland Chamber of Commerce nodding along grimly, understanding that the distinction is largely academic. As Mary D. Kane, President of the Chamber, succinctly put it, “It’s the same problem in different packaging.”

Senator Hershey’s analysis is equally unflinching: Maryland cannot tax its way out of this deficit. Yet that is precisely what legislative leaders are attempting, while Governor Moore offers no resistance. Instead, he indulges in rhetorical hedging, allowing the legislature to move forward with tax increases while preserving a fig leaf of plausible deniability. The message is clear: he may not lead the charge, but he certainly won’t stand in the way.

Senator Justin Ready has articulated the frustration many Marylanders feel, noting that Moore seems more interested in “decisions he’s not making” than those he is. Del. Mark Fisher, never one to mince words, went so far as to accuse Moore of “ignoring Maryland” in favor of his national ambitions. Collins’ reporting underscores this sentiment, documenting Moore’s repeated absences from key budget discussions and his conspicuous silence on looming tax hikes. The governor’s office, when pressed, offered a response so perfunctory as to be insulting—boasting of in-state visits that do nothing to address the gaping chasm in the state’s budget.

It is telling that even as Moore decries the economic consequences of Trump’s tariff policies, his own administration is unable to substantiate the claim that Maryland’s port is suffering. On the contrary, recent data indicates an increase in car and container traffic. It is a curious thing, this compulsion to deflect blame to Washington, even when the facts are uncooperative. But in the absence of decisive leadership, misdirection becomes the next best strategy.

Tyrone Keys, a financial services and real estate expert, has cut through the smokescreen with admirable concision: “We can’t afford anymore.” And that, ultimately, is the reality that eludes Moore and his legislative allies. Marylanders are not an inexhaustible source of revenue. They cannot perpetually absorb the cost of government mismanagement. And they are right to ask: where is our governor?

If Moore harbors aspirations for higher office, he might consider that competent governance is the surest path to political viability. As things stand, his tenure is becoming an exercise in abdication—one where fiscal calamity looms, tax burdens rise, and Maryland’s governor is nowhere to be found.

 

On March 12th there was a joint meeting of the Maryland House and Senate on the electric and gas rates hikes in Annapolis.  The Vice-Chairman of the Committee was Delegate Brian Crosby of St. Mary’s County.

To observe Delegate Crosby in action is to be reminded that bluster is no substitute for wisdom, and that the loudness of one’s indignation does not make a position more valid. Upon watching his obvious attack on political strategist Len Foxwell on the Maryland General Assembly’s livestream, one might wonder whether the delegate from St. Mary’s County thinks he is engaging in serious debate or simply enjoys throwing punches at imaginary enemies. The evidence suggests the latter.

Mr. Foxwell, the principle of Tred Avon Strategies, whose record as a sharp and independent commentator on Maryland politics is well established, had the audacity to point out on social media what should have been obvious to anyone paying attention: Senate Bill 1 – which Delegate Crosby so proudly sponsored,- has had exactly the consequences its critics warned about… to the detriment of Maryland’s already burdened ratepayers.

According to the latest Gonzales Poll, 50% of Marylanders say the state is moving in the wrong direction.  In the same poll, 76% of Marylanders say that their electric bill is much higher (57%) or somewhat higher (19%) compared to one year ago.

Yet instead of responding with a logical argument or engaging in a real discussion, Delegate Crosby opted for a petty tirade, painting Mr. Foxwell as some kind of recluse living in a bunker, accusing him of working for corporate interests, and engaging in the sort of juvenile name-calling one would expect from an internet troll rather than an elected official.

Orwell once warned that some ideas are so absurd only intellectuals believe them, but in this case, even basic reasoning seems to be missing. There is no mystery here. Senate Bill 1, hailed by its corporate backers as a win for consumers, has done exactly what its opponents predicted: it gutted competition in Maryland’s energy market, forced private suppliers out of the state, and left everyday Marylanders stuck with soaring utility bills from monopolies they cannot escape.

That Delegate Crosby now acts surprised is either willful ignorance or political dishonesty. He was warned. He was presented with the facts. And yet, he marched forward, blind to the consequences, dismissing critics who pointed out the obvious flaws in this grand plan.

As for Mr. Foxwell, his argument needs no defense. It is rooted in reality, and reality doesn’t care about a politician’s ego. He has not, as Crosby absurdly claims, “whipped up” public anger. As patently demonstrated in the Gonzales Poll, the public is plenty angry on its own—because they are the ones struggling to pay for heat, light, and basic necessities while Maryland’s utilities rake in record profits. Their anger is justified, because anti-competitive policies like Senate Bill 1 have made life harder for working families who don’t have the luxury of ignoring bad legislation.

Marylanders deserve better. They deserve leaders who take their responsibilities seriously, who listen, who correct courses, and who understand that governance is about more than grandstanding. 

As for Mr. Foxwell, one suspects he will continue doing what he does best: holding the powerful accountable, speaking uncomfortable truths, and refusing to be silenced by the predictable, childish tantrums of those who fear accountability. And for that, he deserves our thanks.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr. is a life-long Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals.  He is co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast that discusses politics, business, and cultural issues. 

“Let me tell you how it will be
There’s one for you, nineteen for me
Cause I’m the taxman
Yeah, I’m the taxman… 

And you’re working for no one but me.”

-The Beatles

In the grand tradition of political mendacity, Governor Wes Moore has presided over what can only be described as a fiscal calamity, an unforced error of staggering proportions. As reported with commendable diligence by Gary Collins of WBFF FOX 45’s Spotlight on Maryland, the state now faces a veritable chasm in its budget – a deficit of $3.3 billion. Instead of deploying the intellectual fortitude required to navigate this quagmire, Moore’s administration has opted for the more convenient approach of feigned obliviousness, coupled with an indiscriminate barrage of tax increases designed to strangle Maryland’s economic vitality.

Among the most egregious of these proposals is the so-called “business-to-business tax” – a “dog whistle” for economic contraction – that will extract a 2.5% levy on indispensable commercial services like marketing, financial planning, IT, and tax preparation, to name but a few. As Collins reports, business owners across the state, from financial experts like Tyrone Keys to small entrepreneurs such as Manchester Town Councilman Ryan Nazelrod, are raising alarms about the dire consequences of these tax hikes. 

It was the late economist Milton Friedman who observed that “inflation is taxation without legislation,” but Moore has spared himself even that philosophical subtlety; he is quite content to impose a direct, palpable, and economically corrosive burden on the very enterprises Maryland ostensibly wishes to attract.

Predictably, the middle class, the backbone of any functioning republic, will be made to bear the brunt of these economic impositions. As Collins reports, Nazelrod, an entrepreneur who endeavors to support his family through a part-time landscaping business, articulated a sentiment that should be axiomatic to any serious statesman: “I feel like it was said we are going to tax richer people, and the middle class is going to be left out of it, but I am a middle-class guy.” And yet, despite the protestations of those whose livelihoods are imperiled by these policies, the Moore administration remains ensconced in a fog of ideological certitude.

Public sentiment aligns with Nazelrod’s concerns. According to the January 2025 Gonzales Poll, Marylanders overwhelmingly oppose raising taxes to address the looming deficit. The poll assessed opinions on property, sales, and income tax increases, and the results were unequivocal. 

A staggering 77% opposed raising property taxes, 76% rejected an income tax hike, and 73% were against increasing the sales tax. Even among Moore’s strongest supporters – those who “strongly approve” of his job performance – opposition to tax increases remained high, with 71% against raising property taxes, 67% opposed to an income tax hike, and 62% rejecting a sales tax increase. This widespread rejection underscores the reality that Moore’s fiscal strategy is fundamentally misaligned with the will of the people he purports to serve.

When confronted with the reality of Maryland’s deteriorating fiscal condition, Moore and his acolytes have displayed a remarkable talent for rhetorical sleight of hand. Delegate Ben Barnes, in a moment of political absurdity that would make Orwell wince, sought to place the blame on “Donald Trump, DOGE, and Elon Musk.” To attribute a state’s fiscal woes to the machinations of a cryptocurrency meme and a South African billionaire requires a level of creative fiction typically reserved for the pages of speculative literature.

Yet even this artful deflection pales in comparison to the governor’s most costly blunder: a prodigious expansion of the state’s payroll. Since taking office, Moore has overseen the hiring of 5,000 new state employees, the cost of which is estimated at $425.7 million annually. 

As Collins further reports, at least 3,300 of these positions stem directly from Moore’s budget priorities. This, in a moment of fiscal peril, is not merely irresponsible but a veritable affront to the principles of sound governance. As Keys astutely observed, “The state should be run under the same general practices that Fortune 500 companies run by. The biggest expense in any organization is the human resource’s part, so where can we find efficiencies?” Alas, such elementary economic reasoning appears to have eluded Moore and his clique of bureaucratic enthusiasts.

When pressed for a coherent response, the Moore administration, in a performance of almost Shakespearean evasion, resorted to that most trite of gubernatorial stratagems: blaming one’s predecessor. The claim that Moore “inherited an economic flatline” is an insult to both historical accuracy and the intelligence of Maryland’s citizenry. Under Governor Larry Hogan, the state’s budgetary affairs were in demonstrably better shape, and to suggest otherwise is to engage in revisionism of the most brazen kind.

The governor’s political capital, meanwhile, is diminishing at a rate commensurate with the state’s economic prospects. His push for alcohol sales in grocery stores was rebuffed, his budgetary decisions overturned by the legislature, and his influence within his own party is, at best, questionable. 

As Collins notes, even the Democratic-controlled legislature has disregarded Moore’s preferences, reinstating millions in funding for the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future after he removed it from the budget. Keys so succinctly put it: “The legislature is supposed to jockey for power, but you may not have as much of that coming from the executive because Wes Moore is a new governor and look, I think everybody knows, he’s not fully focused on the State House.”

Indeed, therein lies the crux of the issue. Moore appears more enamored with the lofty daydreams of national prominence than with the pedestrian responsibilities of state governance. If he continues on this trajectory, his tenure will be remembered not as one of growth and renewal, but as a cautionary tale in the annals of political ambition – a reminder that governing requires not just soaring rhetoric, but the mundane, often tedious, yet absolutely indispensable qualities of prudence, discipline, and a modicum of humility.

Maryland deserves better.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr. is a life-long Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals.  He is co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast that discusses politics, business, and cultural issues. 

 

n Maryland’s General Assembly, an insatiable appetite for taxation continues unabated. Rather than exercising the fiscal discipline expected of responsible stewards of the public trust, lawmakers such as Delegate David Moon (D-Montgomery) remain ideologically beholden to the notion that government largesse must never be curtailed, only expanded. The latest incarnation of this fiscal overreach is a proposed 2.5% sales tax on certain business-to-business services – an imprudent scheme that threatens to undermine Maryland’s economic vitality while serving as a mere stopgap in the face of a looming $3 billion budget deficit.

This taxation policy, as reported by Bryan Sears in Maryland Matters, is yet another attempt by Annapolis’ Democratic majority to siphon additional revenue from Maryland businesses rather than confronting the obvious truth: the state government has grown far beyond its means. Instead of addressing budgetary inefficiencies, implementing structural reforms, or cutting superfluous spending, Delegate Moon and his compatriots believe that Maryland’s private sector—already burdened by high taxes and regulatory constraints—should bear even greater financial strain.

Contrast this reckless profligacy with the reasoned opposition of Senate Minority Leader Stephen S. Hershey Jr. (R-Upper Shore), whose statement cuts through the legislative fog like a scythe. “In the Maryland Democrats’ obsession to raise taxes,” Hershey rightly notes, “they have now concocted a new business-to-business sales tax that will make it even more expensive to operate a business in Maryland.” At a time when neighboring states such as Virginia and Delaware offer far more attractive commercial environments, Maryland’s ruling class appears hellbent on driving enterprise across state lines, leaving economic stagnation and job loss in its wake.

The reasoning offered by Delegate Moon is as audacious as it is specious. With the air of an overconfident central planner impervious to the realities of market forces, Moon asserts that his tax proposal “provides balance” to any necessary spending reductions. This is the language of a politician who sees no intrinsic virtue in a leaner, more efficient government but instead views taxpayers as mere financiers of his legislative wish list. Were Moon and his colleagues sincere in their desire to achieve balance, they would begin by excising wasteful expenditures, consolidating redundant agencies, and reining in the bloated bureaucracy that continues to drain state coffers.

This latest revenue grab also serves as a pointed reminder of Annapolis’ historical ineptitude in taxation policy. One need only recall the infamous 2007 attempt to tax computer services – a disastrous experiment that was quickly repealed after a swift and well-justified backlash. The current proposal, which targets accounting, lobbying, and IT services, is simply a variation on that same failed theme, one that will yield similar economic consequences should it pass.

Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) and his confederates argue that the evolving economy necessitates a revised tax structure. Yet their approach is as unoriginal as it is damaging. A “service-based economy,” as Ferguson describes it, is indeed an economic reality, but the answer to shifting economic paradigms is not to tax innovation and entrepreneurship into oblivion. True economic stewardship requires fostering a business climate conducive to growth, not one that penalizes success with an ever-expanding web of taxation.

Maryland’s taxpayers and business community should be outraged. They should reject outright the fallacious notion that government’s first recourse in times of financial strain must be to extract more from those who produce. Instead, the electorate must demand a thorough reformation of state spending priorities, a commitment to fiscal restraint, and the eradication of policies that punish economic productivity.

Delegate Moon’s proposal is not merely a misguided policy – it is an affront to sound governance. Meanwhile, Senator Hershey and his Republican colleagues, though outnumbered, stand as the last bulwark against this relentless march toward fiscal irresponsibility. Marylanders must rally behind them and demand better from their elected officials. 

The choice is clear: we either capitulate to the unchecked expansion of government and its insatiable hunger for revenue, or we reassert the primacy of free enterprise and responsible governance. Let us hope that reason prevails before Maryland’s economic fortunes are further imperiled… but I’m not holding my breath.

Clayton A. Mitchell, Sr. is a life-long Eastern Shoreman, an attorney, and former Chairman of the Maryland Department of Labor’s Board of Appeals.  He is co-host of the Gonzales/Mitchell Show podcast that discusses politics, business, and cultural issues.