Angela Alsobrooks won a U.S. Senate seat Tuesday to become the first Black candidate to be elected senator in Maryland, as the Democrat prevailed in a blue state against popular Republican, former Gov. Larry Hogan, NBC News and the Associated Press project.
The race has been widely watched with control of the Senate potentially at stake. It keeps retiring Sen. Ben Cardin’s seat blue.
Hogan said he called Alsobrooks to congratulate her on her victory Tuesday night.
“In our nation’s history, only three African American women have ever served in U.S. Senate,” Hogan told the audience at his watch party. “Tonight, regardless of who you voted for, we can all take pride in the election of the first Black woman to represent Maryland in the United States Senate.”
Hogan called it a privilege to have worked with Alsobrooks when he served as governor.
“Now is the time to come together and move forward as one state and one nation, to respect the will of the voters and the outcome of the democratic process,” he said.
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"Throughout this campaign — and during her time in public service — Angela has proven her commitment and passion for serving Marylanders time and again," said U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., in a statement.
“Angela Alsobrooks will fight every single day for the values we cherish as Americans – from the ability to have economic mobility and own more than you owe, to the freedom of feeling safe in your own skin and your own community, to having control over personal health care decisions,” Democratic Gov. Wes Moore said in a statement.
Alsobrooks campaigned heavily on abortion rights in a year that Maryland voters approved a ballot measure to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution. She said she heard on the campaign trail how much abortion rights matter to voters.
“I hear it not just from women, but I’ve heard from a number of men who say that they want the freedom for their daughters and their granddaughters, and that they’re very concerned about the direction we’re heading for people to make reproductive choices,” Alsobrooks said in a September interview with The Associated Press.
In his campaign, Hogan said he would support abortion rights, but Alsobrooks argued he could not be trusted to do so. She cited his veto of legislation to expand access to abortion in Maryland while he was governor and then withheld money for abortion training after the legislature overrode his veto.
Alsobrooks deftly used television ads to emphasize that the race could determine Senate control, putting Maryland in the unusual position of a potential swing state in a year of high political stakes.
Voters for Alsobrooks frequently mentioned the significance of fending off a challenge by the popular Republican in order to keep the seat blue with the control of the Senate potentially at stake.
“I don’t want to see the Senate go Republican,” said Donald Huber, a 72-year-old Democrat voting in Annapolis on Tuesday. “Simple as that. I don’t want to see it turn.”
Alsobrooks supporters noted she would bring greater diversity to the Senate, and they said she is better positioned to address problems facing the state and the nation.
“Angela is really down-to-earth, and she has real solutions, real answers, to the real problems, and I feel Hogan does not have that,” said Zack Buster, a 22-year-old Democrat from Glen Burnie, who voted for Alsobrooks during the early voting period.
Hogan supporters said they liked the job the former governor did while in office.
“I thought he did a really good job as governor, and I like the idea that I think he’ll be independent and try to work both sides, whereas I think the lady, Alsobrooks, I think she would have just been a rubber stamp for the Democrats,” said Dale Schulz, a 79-year-old Annapolis resident, after voting Tuesday in Annapolis.
Hogan, who has been one of former President Donald Trump’s fiercest Republican critics, campaigned on providing an independent voice in Washington. But Alsobrooks challenged that constantly in her ads, which included video clips of the former governor saying he opposed abortion and praising the Supreme Court justices who enabled Roe v. Wade to be struck down in 2022.
Alsobrooks overcame criticism from Hogan after it was reported by CNN in September that she improperly claimed property tax credits for two homes, something her campaign said she was unaware of and has started to repay with interest.
While a Republican has not won a Senate race in Maryland in more than 40 years, Hogan was the most formidable candidate fielded by the GOP in the state in years. The two-term former governor had won over enough Democratic voters to win two statewide races in 2014 and 2018 in a state where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1.
Still, Hogan had a difficult needle to thread. This election was the first time Hogan ran on the same ballot as Trump, who is deeply unpopular in Maryland. Hogan’s criticism of Trump, while helping to win some Democrats whose support he had to have to win statewide, turned off some Republican voters.
Alsobrooks also campaigned on gun control. Vice President Kamala Harris, a friend of Alsobrooks, made a campaign stop in Maryland for her, where they both spoke about the significance of taking action against gun violence.
Since 2018, Alsobrooks, 53, has served as the county executive of Prince George’s County, Maryland’s second most populous jurisdiction in the suburbs of the nation’s capital. Before that, she served as the county’s top prosecutor.
“We created more businesses,” she said in the AP interview about her local government experience. “I’ll be doing that for the whole state and transferring the skills that I have developed not just as executive, but as chief law enforcement officer as the prosecutor in Prince George’s County.”
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