Politics

The Maryland Senate passed an extensive climate change bill Monday night that would set the state on track to cut its greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2045, partly by requiring large buildings to reduce their energy usage. The Senate passed the Climate Solutions Now Act of 2022 in a 32-15 party-line vote, with Republicans opposed. The bill is now headed to the House of Delegates, where lawmakers have introduced their own set of companion bills instead of a single sweeping measure.

Gov. Larry Hogan says Maryland would like to keep the Washington Commanders in the state, but it will not “get in a bidding war” to build a new stadium for the NFL franchise. Hogan made the comments Tuesday in Annapolis in response to a reporter’s question at a press conference on a new workforce development initiative for state jobs. “I think [the Commanders are] using everyone back and forth as they have been for eight years. They’re negotiating, pitting everyone against each other,” said Hogan, suggesting the Commanders are setting Maryland, D.C. and Virginia against one another to get a better stadium deal.

Primary elections are awkward enough for candidates who, more often than not, share mostly similar politics, a political party and a history of working together. But when you’re running against the spouse of someone you shared a gubernatorial ticket with? “This one probably has to be the most awkward, and I’ll leave it at that,” U.S. Rep. Anthony Brown said in an interview with the Maryland State Bar Association when asked about his primary opponent.

Led by Gov. Glenn Youngkin and the head of Transurban North America, Northern Virginia leaders celebrated the extension of privately-owned toll lanes along the Capital Beltway on Monday — an expansion that is expected to bring the firm’s signature lanes to within a few yards of the Commonwealth’s border with Maryland. Construction of an additional 2.5 miles of “Express” lanes, which will carry traffic between the Dulles Toll Road and the American Legion Bridge, will begin in the coming weeks, with an expected completion date of 2025. Transurban already owns and operates 53 miles of toll lanes in Northern Virginia, with more planned along Interstate 95 south of Springfield.

Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan is planning trips to Iowa and New Hampshire. Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., is considering a rough timeline for a potential presidential announcement. And allies of Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., are openly talking up her White House prospects. More than two years before the next presidential election, a shadow primary is already beginning to take shape among at least three fierce Republican critics of former President Donald Trump to determine who is best positioned to occupy the anti-Trump lane in 2024.

Lawmakers began the legislative session considering a measure that would offer paid family and medical leave to all Marylanders, but a key House committee is now considering whether to instead a establish a commission that would work out the finer details of a statewide paid family and medical leave insurance program. As originally introduced, House Bill 496, sponsored by Dels. C.T. Wilson (D-Charles), Kriselda Valderrama (D-Prince George’s) and Ariana Kelly (D-Montgomery), would have allowed all Marylanders, both part-time and full-time employees who have worked 680 hours in the past year, to take 12 weeks of paid leave following childbirth or to take care of themselves or a family member experiencing serious health issues.

A Maryland Democratic Party official and longtime party donor has resigned after an email she sent questioning the electability of Black candidates in the state’s governor’s race, the state party chair announced Monday. Barbara Goldberg Goldman, who was the deputy treasurer for the party in Maryland, “has tendered her resignation and I have accepted it,” Yvette Lewis, the state party chair, said in a statement.