All across America on Tuesday night, the David Smiths of the world were getting their way. Election results trickled in, and they were turning red — even in cities. But in Baltimore Smith was being dealt a tremendous blow.
The Baltimore County media mogul’s latest political project, a ballot measure to shrink the size of City Council, was beaten back at the ballot box.
It had been widely assumed that Smith’s Question H would pass. Ballot measures in Baltimore almost always do. The Baltimore Sun, which Smith owns, had run a number of full-page ads in support of the measure and published a weekslong series of articles meant to examine whether City Council members were “effective.” Smith’s TV station, WBFF Fox45, took a literal soapbox around town and invited residents to bash city leadership on camera. Privately, councilmembers braced for a loss.
But on a night when the nation anointed a president promising to squeeze “bloated federal bureaucracy,” Baltimoreans stood firm. Known as Question H, Smith’s ballot measure got beat by almost 25 percentage points, a number that could change as more votes are tallied. It was the first time in 20 years that city voters rejected a ballot question.
More importantly, according to members of a broad opposition coalition, the results sent a message to Smith that, no matter how much money he spends or how much favorable coverage his media properties give his issues, Baltimore cannot so easily be bought.
“It means that we can defeat folks who have unlimited airtime, unlimited print and seemingly money,” Mayor Brandon Scott said at a somber Wednesday morning news conference at City Hall. “All we have to do is tell our residents the truth and communicate with them in the right way.”
Smith did not respond to emails seeking comment.
In the buildup to the referendum vote, City Council members often shied away from criticizing Smith, instead sticking to policy arguments against reduced representation. But members seemed emboldened — gleeful, even — as results began to pour in Tuesday night.
“He’s rich, but I don’t know if he’s smart,” Councilmember Ryan Dorsey said of Smith.
Question H was not Smith’s first defeat this year. Two high-profile candidates in the Democratic primaries — former Mayor Sheila Dixon and outgoing Councilmember Eric Costello — received money from Smith.
The measure to shrink City Council upped the ante. Had it been successful, it would have proven that a wealthy person could fundamentally change how the city is governed with a relatively small amount of money — campaign finance reports detailing spending at the end of the election have not been posted, but Smith likely spent less than $600,000 on the effort going back to 2023.
Instead, it gave City Council and Scott something they hadn’t yet had: a common boogeyman. Factions banded together. The labor unions gave money. Even the Green Party got in on the action. The incoming councilmembers learned how to work together. They had to, because otherwise six of their jobs would be toast in four years.
“It was kind of a gift that David Smith and the proponents of the bill gave this city,” said Zac Blanchard, who unseated Costello by a thin margin in May.
But the opposition campaign took a while to rev up, said Jermaine Jones, who upset a veteran East Baltimore councilmember in May and clinched victory in the general election Tuesday.
Jones said voters showed little enthusiasm about the measure when he knocked on doors during a September canvassing event in Northeast Baltimore. But he became more confident in Question H’s demise Sunday, he said, when voters he met were more aware.
Election returns showed the coalition building strength, Jones said. Mail ballots were split almost evenly for and against Question H. But, as volunteers parked themselves at the polls and spoke with voters, momentum turned. Early and Election Day voters overwhelmingly rejected the measure.
The Baltimore City Is Not for Sale campaign recruited more than 300 volunteers, hit 3,000 doors, dropped 15,000 pieces of literature and spoke with 45 community groups, according to a Tuesday night news release celebrating its unlikely win. Claudia Leight, a volunteer, said Wednesday that the coalition also did text banking, appeared at farmers markets and made contact with faith-based leaders to help get the message out.
But some voters said they voted against the question not because of who was backing it but what it said.
Ronald Carter had a “gut feeling” at the ballot box, the 62-year-old East Baltimore man said Tuesday evening, and voted to keep the council size as is.
Pamela Hursey, in Northwest Baltimore, had a similar reaction upon reading the question Tuesday. A proud Democrat who voted blue up and down the ticket, Hursey, 57, said she found the premise lacking.
“We need all the help we can get,” she said about the council. She voted against it.
Compared to Smith and his allies, the coalition spent relatively little money on the countereffort, noted Roger Hartley, dean of the University of Baltimore College of Public Affairs. Though the momentum was stacked in Smith’s favor, he said, voters may have felt the cuts proposed to the council went too far.
Smith, though, may not retreat from Baltimore politics, Hartley added. A previous Smith-sponsored ballot question about term limits passed in 2022. He has also tried, and failed, to get recall elections on the ballot. He may feel he’s gotten his money’s worth this time around, Hartley said.
“He could say he got a huge discussion going,” Hartley said. “It may be like, ‘Oh, this is a loss, but I got people to have to organize and spend money and make an effort.”
A group called People for Elected Accountability and Civic Engagement, or PEACE, does the outreach and organizing for Smith’s ballot questions — he’s been its sole source of funding. PEACE Chairman Jovani Patterson, who once ran for council president as a Republican, acknowledged he could have run a better campaign in support of Question H. There was little traditional campaigning beyond the newspaper advertisements and soft-focus coverage in Smith-controlled outlets.
The city’s elected officials have done a “fantastic job” of making Smith out to be a villain, Patterson said.
“When you read his writing and you hear some of the things that he says, it comes from a place of wanting to help Baltimore. Of course, for some reason, it’s bad to be rich. It’s bad to be wealthy. It’s bad to be white, quite frankly, in a place like Baltimore,” said Patterson, who is Black.
And the Rev. Alvin Hathaway, a high school classmate of Smith’s at City College, argued that Smith has been painted the wrong way in Baltimore, saying his peer has high-minded ideals that have motivated his political involvement.
Hathaway, whose nonprofit Beloved Community Services Corp. received $290,000 from the David D. Smith Foundation in 2020, said in an interview this year that he has seen Smith invest in the Black community and Black entrepreneurs, and he doesn’t view him as an ideologue, as many others in Baltimore do. Though Hathaway didn’t agree with Smith on Question H, he didn’t fault him for using democratic processes to advance it.
“You need every perspective at the table,” Hathaway said. “It’s just he’s willing to put his money where his mouth is.”
Patterson did not specifically lay out future plans for PEACE but indicated the group would be back.
“You live and you learn, and you take notes for next time,” he said. “There’s always a next time.”
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