A Maryland Judge Throws the Democrats' Mid-Decade Gerrymander Off the November Ballot — Ruling the General Assembly Broke Its Own Deadline and Wrote "Intentionally Misleading" Ballot Language

August 27, 2026

On August 26, 2026, Anne Arundel County Circuit Judge Robert J. Thompson blocked a Democratic-backed constitutional amendment from appearing on Maryland's November general election ballot. The amendment was the vehicle Maryland Democrats had built during an August special session to let the General Assembly redraw the state's congressional map before 2028 — a map that would almost certainly have eliminated the Eastern Shore seat held by Rep. Andy Harris, the state's lone Republican in Congress and chairman of the House Freedom Caucus. Thompson found three separate defects. Lawmakers missed the statutory deadline they themselves had enacted in April for placing measures on the ballot; the ballot question's claim that it merely "clarifies" the Constitution's compactness standards was intentionally misleading; and the measure violated the single-subject rule by also handing the Maryland Supreme Court original jurisdiction over congressional redistricting suits. "Because the legislature did not follow the very laws it enacted," Thompson wrote, "the court finds the enactment of HB2100 to be legally deficient." Thompson stayed his own order pending appeal, and the state noted an appeal to the Maryland Supreme Court within hours. Gov. Wes Moore and the General Assembly's two presiding officers said they expect to be vindicated; Harris and Annapolis Republicans treated the ruling as proof that the majority had tried to rewrite the state constitution without following it. The case is the Democratic counterpart to the mid-decade redistricting fights the site has tracked in Texas, Indiana, Florida, Virginia and South Carolina, and its outcome determines whether Maryland can answer those maps before the 2028 cycle.