Angela Alsobrooks received a U.S. Senate seat on Tuesday to turn into the primary Black candidate to be elected senator in Maryland, because the Democrat prevailed in a blue state towards common Republican former Gov. Larry Hogan.
The race has been extensively watched with management of the Senate doubtlessly at stake.
Alsobrooks campaigned closely on abortion rights in a yr that Maryland voters accredited a poll measure to enshrine abortion rights within the state structure. She mentioned she heard on the marketing campaign path how a lot 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 mentioned in a September interview with The Related Press.
In his marketing campaign, Hogan mentioned he would help abortion rights, however Alsobrooks argued he couldn’t be trusted to take action. She cited his veto of laws to increase entry to abortion in Maryland whereas he was governor after which withheld cash for abortion coaching after the legislature overrode his veto.
Alsobrooks deftly used tv adverts to emphasise that the race may decide Senate management, placing Maryland within the uncommon place of a possible swing state in a yr of excessive political stakes.
Hogan, who has been certainly one of former President Donald Trump’s fiercest Republican critics, campaigned on offering an unbiased voice in Washington. However Alsobrooks challenged that continuously in her adverts, which included video clips of the previous governor saying he opposed abortion and praising the Supreme Court docket 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 credit for 2 houses, one thing her marketing campaign mentioned she was unaware of and has began to repay with curiosity.
Whereas a Republican has not received a Senate race in Maryland in additional than 40 years, Hogan was essentially the most formidable candidate fielded by the GOP within the state in years. The 2-term former governor had received over sufficient Democratic voters to win two statewide races in 2014 and 2018 in a state the place Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-1.
Nonetheless, Hogan had a troublesome needle to string. This election was the primary time Hogan ran on the identical poll as Trump, who’s deeply unpopular in Maryland. Hogan’s criticism of Trump, whereas serving to to win some Democrats whose help he needed to should win statewide, turned off some Republican voters.
Alsobrooks additionally campaigned on gun management. Vice President Kamala Harris, a good friend of Alsobrooks, made a marketing campaign cease in Maryland for her, the place they each spoke in regards to the significance of taking motion towards gun violence.
“We should be working to remove ghost guns from our streets,” Alsobrooks informed AP in September. “We should be working to make sure that we have really sensible gun legislation that gets guns out of the hands of the wrong people and further protects our children.”
Since 2018, Alsobrooks, 53, has served because the county govt of Prince George’s County, Maryland’s second most populous jurisdiction within the suburbs of the nation’s capital. Earlier than that, she served because the county’s prime prosecutor.
“We created more businesses,” she mentioned within the AP interview about her native authorities expertise. “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.”
