“And it really doesn’t matter
If I’m wrong, I’m right
Where I belong, I’m right
Where I belong.
See the people standing there
Who disagree and never win…
And wonder why they don’t get in my door.”
- The Beatles (“Fixing A Hole”)
Less than three years after promising to rebuild Maryland’s government by staffing up thousands of long-vacant positions, Governor Wes Moore is abruptly slamming the brakes with a statewide hiring freeze, voluntary buyouts, and a quiet dismantling of the same workforce he spent most of his term rebuilding. It is the kind of maneuver that only a technocratic spin doctor could try to dress as “responsible, deliberate, and innovative,” as Moore declared in a staff memo… a memo that conveniently avoided on-the-record questions from the press.
Thanks to Pamela Wood’s reporting for The Baltimore Banner, we now know the Moore administration is planning to eliminate jobs, freeze hiring, and consolidate offices, all to patch together $121 million in savings for the upcoming fiscal year.
But let us not forget how we got here. Moore and his confederates in the General Assembly are scrambling to paper over the consequences of their own lamentable budget decisions.
This is not fiscal responsibility. This is window dressing. The $3 billion in total cuts being trumpeted by Moore’s legislative allies, such as House Appropriations Chair Ben Barnes, are a direct reaction to a budget that exploded in size under Moore’s watch. The very structural deficit the governor now claims to have “put in order” was fueled by his own free-spending, tax-hiking agenda. This is the same agenda that grew the government faster than Maryland’s economy and imposed long-term obligations with no long-term plan or stable sources of revenue.
When Moore took office, he repeatedly criticized the Hogan administration for leaving the government too lean and hollowed out. He promised to hire at least 5,000 workers to fix what he described as “chronic understaffing.” He called it a moral mission to restore public service. He even launched a program to funnel laid-off federal workers from the Trump administration into Maryland’s civil service.
What happened to those promises?
Pamela Wood’s Banner report notes that the Moore administration will not say which vacant positions are being eliminated or who will be eligible for buyouts. They will not even disclose the terms of the buyouts.
That silence is telling.
The truth is likely inconvenient: many of the jobs Moore so proudly filled are now being quietly erased, and the state has nothing to show for them except a ballooning payroll and worsening public services.
AFSCME Maryland Council 3, which represents more than 26,000 state workers, warned about “chronic understaffing, dangerous working conditions, and unsustainable workloads.” It turns out the Moore administration’s hiring binge was a mirage. It was indeed a public relations effort masquerading as governance.
Republicans, for their part, are crowing about this U-turn. Senate Minority Leader Steve Hershey correctly labeled the move a “textbook example of how Republican fiscal discipline ends up saving the day.” House Minority Leader Jason Buckel went further: “The level of government employee growth under this administration is unaffordable and unsustainable.”
They are right… but this was no accident. Wes Moore is not reluctantly cleaning up someone else’s mess. He is cleaning up his own mess with a broom made of broken promises.
The Moore administration blew out the budget with permanent programs and short-term thinking, pretending federal COVID dollars and accounting gimmicks would somehow carry the day. They oversold Marylanders on the fantasy of expanded government and undersold the cost.
And now, barely sixty days after declaring victory over the deficit, the Moore administration is quietly hollowing out the government again. This time it is not for ideology, but out of sheer desperation.
The same governor who campaigned on a message of “leaving no one behind” is now turning his back on the very workforce he promised to rebuild. The Moore administration’s so-called turnaround is no triumph. It is a cautionary tale of reckless expansion followed by quiet retreat, all packaged in the language of innovation.
I hope his supporters see the irony of Moore’s DOGE program. This mismanagement from our part-time governor is not acceptable.
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.
Janet Sweeney says
Excellent article. You hit the nail on the head,!
Jim Wilkins says
It’s getting exhausting replying to all the disinformation/ incomplete information that Mr. Mitchell seems to publish every week. But let’s look at some important facts staring at our state government. The state derives a large portion of its revenue from the federal government. That funding has been drastically reduced by whom? You guessed it- our Republican president and his enablers in Congress. Their big ugly bill proposes taking away hundreds of millions of dollars from state governments in the form of reduced payments for things like Medicare and Medicaid. These reductions in revenue must be made up somehow. Moore couldn’t have predicted that we would end up in this situation but I guess he should have planned for disaster according to Mitchell. Of course hindsight is 20/20- right Clayton? I guess we are to believe that a republican would do a much better job as governor than Moore. All we need to do is look to Washington where the reverse Robin Hood R’s are about to enact their beautiful take-from-the-poor-and-give-to-the-rich bill.
CLAYTON A MITCHELL SR says
Thank you for your comment. I understand the impulse to blame Washington for Maryland’s budget woes. But the current fiscal freeze, hiring moratorium, and voluntary buyout programs were not triggered by a surprise event. They are the result of decisions made right here in Annapolis.
Governor Moore came into office promising to transform government, expand programs, and fix service delivery. He also filled thousands of vacant state positions. Now, eighteen months later, he is trying to explain to state employees and taxpayers why many of those same positions are being eliminated. Pamela Wood’s excellent reporting in the Baltimore Banner confirms that the administration declined to answer questions on the record about the plan. This is not about federal cuts. It is about a budgetary reversal.
Maryland received more than $14 billion in one-time COVID relief funds in recent years, and much of that was spent or obligated without permanent funding sources. The Moore administration supported and signed into law massive recurring spending increases through the Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, Medicaid expansion, and climate transition plans—without corresponding revenue growth.
Now, with the federal largesse drying up and structural deficits on the horizon, Governor Moore has chosen the optics of restraint after spending nearly two years growing the base budget.
As for the idea that a Republican governor would somehow be worse: Let me remind you that Maryland had a two-term Republican governor just prior to Moore. During those eight years, Maryland maintained its AAA bond rating, balanced its budgets, and did not resort to last-minute hiring freezes or smoke-and-mirror savings plans. What we did not do was overpromise and then hide behind partisan blame when reality set in.
And make no mistake—Governor Moore will face competition. In the Democratic primary, he will be challenged by Ed Hale, a Blue Dog Democrat with deep business experience and a track record of job creation. Hale is offering a centrist alternative rooted in fiscal realism and practical governance, not slogans and optics. The Democratic primary will not be a coronation.
Marylanders deserve transparency, accountability, and leadership grounded in reality—not ideological deflection or revisionist history. If that is exhausting, it is only because the truth keeps catching up to the narrative.
Jim Wilkins says
Hi Mr Moore
I understand your desire to paper over your party’s irresponsible actions in Washington but all of your excuses don’t excuse the fact that the Trump administration is hell bent on destroying the social structure that has served our country well for many decades and has provided at least a floor for adequate healthcare and other social services that are badly needed by the working poor. What Maryland does not need is more leadership from and tax breaks for Oligarchs. So your suggestion that a more “business oriented” candidate sounds like more of the same from the Republican establishment.
Darrell Parsons says
Jim, exhausting as it is, please keep answering these Mitchell letters. It’s obvious to me that he cherry picks information, etc, but since I’m not particularly knowledgeable about state politics I am grateful for your ability to counter his glib rhetoric.
David Taylor says
Ignirance is bliss, isn’t it.