Maryland Challenges Federal Immigration Enforcement While Navigating Budget Constraints and Leadership Changes

Maryland lawmakers and advocates publicly challenged the interim director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Baltimore field office last week at the state’s premier policymaking gathering, questioning agents’ tactics for targeting and detaining immigrants. They urged resistance against what they described as the Trump administration’s harsher enforcement crackdown edicts, highlighting growing tensions over federal immigration policies.

Governor Wes Moore’s aggressive efforts to recruit displaced federal workers collided with the state’s harsh budget realities. Despite publicly pressing state agencies to fast-track hiring of laid-off civil servants earlier this year, financial constraints have frozen out many potential hires, undermining the plan to turn the federal government’s loss into Maryland’s gain.

In a significant leadership shift, the Abell Foundation has selected Fagan Harris, Governor Moore’s chief of staff, as its new president. Harris will become just the second head of the Baltimore-based foundation, succeeding Bob Embry who announced his departure earlier this year after leading the organization since 1987. The foundation manages more than $300 million in assets and spends approximately $15 million annually.

Attorney General Anthony Brown has joined two more multistate lawsuits against the Trump administration, including one over proposed caps on administrative costs for renewable energy projects and another concerning restrictions for federal grants for crime victims. These legal actions reflect Maryland’s ongoing opposition to federal policies under the current administration.

Republicans, including Maryland Representative Andy Harris, are considering including community project funding in the next government spending bill, a return to past practices where members of Congress could direct money to their districts. This potential move could bring over $300 million to local developments across Maryland, with Harris and his allies suggesting that allowing earmarks alongside a flat-funded, short-term spending bill would help avoid passage of a larger, full-year package at higher funding levels.

Maryland has also joined the growing number of states legalizing water cremation, with the process now available in West Baltimore. The method involves dissolving a body in a water-filled chamber, leaving behind bones and a watery solution of amino acids and sugars, representing an alternative to traditional burial and cremation methods.

The state’s political journalism community mourns the loss of Jules Witcover, who died at 98. Witcover was known as one of the best-sourced political reporters of his generation, writing more than a dozen books on politics and maintaining a long-running syndicated column with his Baltimore Sun colleague Jack Germond. His work, particularly "Marathon: The Pursuit of the Presidency 1972-1976," established him as a definitive chronicler of American political campaigns.