When Maryland legislators remade congressional maps in 1990, one Democrat was left out.
Tom McMillen, the former pro basketball player who represented Annapolis, was shoved into a 1st District death match with Republican incumbent Wayne Gilchrest.
When the Crofton resident lost in 1992, he did not go softly into the political night.
“I think it was folly for a Democratic state to pass a Republican plan,” McMillen told The Baltimore Sun.
Annapolis has been here before.
If the General Assembly adopts the map revealed Tuesday by Gov. Wes Moore’s redistricting commission — no sure thing — it would plot a path forward to the past by reknitting Annapolis and the Eastern Shore.
Connected by the Chesapeake Bay Bridge today, Maryland’s capital has long been linked to the counties across the water by culture and politics.
Wealthy Eastern Shore planters built many of the stately Colonial homes in Annapolis, bringing their enslaved servants with them.
Kent Island, the eastern landing spot for the bridge, is, to many, a suburb of Annapolis. Life on the water unites the area.
And for a decade Annapolis and the shore shared the 1st District.
U.S. Rep. Sarah Elfreth is the one getting McMillened this time, and she’s taking it much more stoically than McMillen did.
Getting rid of Republican U.S. Rep. Andy Harris is the point of this exercise, and Elfreth is clearly seen as the one best suited, by geography and temperament, to do the deed.
“I’m not at all intimidated by the prospects of going up against the chair of the Freedom Caucus,” the freshman Democrat said. “And I truly believe that a difficult campaign makes for a better representative. It’s hands down the best way to learn a community.”
The Democrats’ goal is to foil a plot President Donald Trump and Republicans in Texas launched to move up redistricting to stack the midterms. It’s fighting cynicism with cynicism.
In McMillen’s day, the Maryland Republican Party was strong enough to influence the map. He wasn’t a beloved figure.
He blamed then-Gov. William Donald Schaefer for his demise, saying the former Baltimore mayor put his thumbprint on the map to protect his friend, U.S. Rep. Helen Delich Bentley.
Elfreth’s 3rd District, once represented by McMillen, includes half of Anne Arundel County, all of Howard County and a sliver of Carroll.
If the lines move as suggested, voters in a swath from Columbia to Annapolis will migrate to the 1st. Seven of the nine shore counties would remain in the district, while Cecil, Harford and parts of Baltimore County would shift into the 3rd.
The numbers would favor Democrats, potentially giving the party eight seats in Congress instead of seven. It would divide Anne Arundel into three districts.
Elfreth’s election was on a map that split the county between two districts, down from four. Retiring U.S. Rep. Steny Hoyer got the remainder in the 5th — lots of land with fewer people.
In the state Senate, Elfreth focused on passing bills, sometimes dozens a year. It’s effective, but it opened her to criticism about numbers vs. impact.
In Congress, she tried it again. She sponsored five bills that passed, although they were wrapped into big procurement and defense spending legislation.
They require service academies to develop climate change plans — avoiding the term — write the existing national cyber academic center into law, make it easier for cyber personnel to get mental health support, extend the deadline for service members in college to start law school and block a golf course at Greenbury Point.
Not a partisan fight in sight. That’s another clue to the commission’s reasoning.
Elfreth takes pride in working with Republicans. Her state Senate district, which she represented for six years, stretched from Annapolis to the Calvert County line.
She shared it with Republican Del. Seth Howard, a gun-loving conservative who represents its reddest precincts.
Progressive Democrats complain about Elfreth being too moderate. David Trone, the liquor store billionaire trying to regain the 6th District seat, posted on social media that she and 74 other Democrats signed a resolution thanking Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents last year.
Accurate, if a bit misleading. She signed H.R. 488 in June, condemning a violent attack on peaceful protesters in Boulder, Colorado, calling for the release of Israeli hostages taken at the start of the war in Gaza.
But the Republican resolution contained a sentence expressing gratitude to ICE agents for protecting the homeland. Those agents are the shock troops of Trump’s war on Democrat-led cities, and Elfreth signed on to a symbolic impeachment drive against Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem.
Moderation makes her an easier sell for Eastern Shore voters, consistently conservative but perhaps tired of Harris’ years of drama.
At 68, Harris — who said he plans to sue to block the map — might not run. But that wouldn’t fit his pugilistic style.
Yet the congressman is no fool. If Democrats take the House in the midterms, as some polling suggests, there will be some pissed-off members in the new majority.
He was an active participant in the 2020 failed coup by Trump, trying to cancel electoral votes from five states the Democrats won.
McMillen had friends in the State House, even if they couldn’t save him. One was then-Senate President Mike Miller.
Elfreth has friends, too, chief among them Senate President Bill Ferguson. A member of the commission, he labeled the map “objectively unconstitutional.”
If it were to pass, the biggest advantage isn’t even on the map — the Chesapeake Bay.
Elfreth, a champion of the environment, would represent more shoreline than any other member of Congress, making her a powerful force in deciding its future.
We’ll know soon if this map has a chance. My guess? It dies in the Senate.
If it passes, though, Annapolis may find itself the capital of Maryland, home to the critical mass of bay restoration and, suddenly, the center of gravity for the Eastern Shore again.
Comments
Welcome to The Banner's subscriber-only commenting community. Please review our community guidelines.