Mass federal layoffs. A record-setting shutdown. Many people in Montgomery County worry about the local economy.

But government officials — including the head of the state’s commerce department — see the county as Maryland’s economic engine, one that will continue to run strong.

Maryland’s most populous and wealthiest county contributes more to the state’s domestic product than any other.

It hosts many companies in the industries that Gov. Wes Moore says will kick-start a state economy that was largely stagnant in the years before he took office in 2023.

“There is a real opportunity for Montgomery County to become the leading area for these industries,” said Elana Fine, board chair for the Montgomery County Economic Development Corp.

The governor and his team have laid out three “lighthouse industries” — information technology, life sciences, and aerospace and defense — to signal the state’s priorities for investment, expansion and job growth.

In a visit to the county Thursday, state Commerce Secretary Harry Coker said Montgomery County can be a leader in Maryland’s push to attract and expand life science companies in particular.

Coker’s visit included tours of Omega 3 Nutrition in Rockville and X-energy, a nuclear reactor and fuel design technology company that recently announced plans to consolidate two Rockville offices into a new headquarters in Gaithersburg.

The secretary also went to Deka Biosciences in Germantown and Donohoe Hospitality Services in Bethesda.

The Washington capital area is known nationally in the life sciences industry — a trade publication has ranked it the third-largest cluster of biopharmaceutical companies in the country, trailing only San Francisco and Boston.

Montgomery County is home to more than 350 life sciences companies, including AstraZeneca, Novavax and United Therapeutics.

Federal agencies headquartered in the county, including the National Institutes of Health, the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, have long attracted private companies.

Economists and government officials, though, have for years been wary of the relationship with the federal government, questioning whether the county and the state are too reliant on Washington for jobs and funding.

Those concerns have been pronounced as the Trump administration has slashed federal jobs and programs across departments.

“We have been blessed with fabulous federal facilities for generations. In my humble opinion, we became complacent,” Coker said of the state’s previous administrations.

Even before the 43-day shutdown, some economists and local business and political leaders expressed concern that the county could lose much of its highly trained and educated workforce.

But Coker conveyed optimism for Montgomery County’s ability to attract life sciences companies and help them grow, particularly in the computational health field.

He highlighted the University of Maryland Institute for Health Computing, a North Bethesda-based program partnering with federal agencies and biotech companies to use advanced computing for improving personalized health and precision medicine.

Maryland has established its hub for information technology and quantum computing with the Discovery District near College Park.

But the state has yet to identify its central location for computational health. Coker said Montgomery County should be the place.

Fine said her organization is pushing for the county — through the public schools system, Montgomery College and other institutions — to nurture talent in the biological sciences.

The county, she said, has a strong pipeline of people trained to work in biotechnology and the life sciences but needs to bolster its information technology workforce.

Part of the solution should be opening students’ eyes to the opportunities, she said. Just about every public elementary school student in the county visits Strathmore, she said, referring to the arts venue in North Bethesda.

“Every student should also go to AstraZeneca, or go to the [Institute for Health Computing], or go over to Montgomery College,” she said, “and see all of the things that Montgomery County has to offer.”