Gov. Wes Moore stakes his reputation on the high-profile Senate race

Gov. Wes Moore is not on the ballot in Maryland this year.

But Moore has been campaigning in the state’s Senate race as though his own future were at stake.

That’s because it is, Moore said in an interview.

A 45-year-old Democrat who is widely seen as a possible future candidate for the White House, Moore acknowledged in direct terms that he sees the outcome of Maryland’s open seat as being — in part — a statement on his own political credibility.

“It’s something that’s impossible not to think about,” Moore told POLITICO.

If Republicans won a Senate race in Maryland, an event not seen since the end of the Cold War, it would plainly reflect poorly on the state’s whole Democratic establishment — including the governor.

The campaign pits Democrat Angela Alsobrooks, the Prince George’s county executive, against Larry Hogan, the popular former governor who is perhaps the Republican Party’s strongest recruit in any Senate race this year.

Moore campaigned hard for Alsobrooks in the Democratic primary, helping her defeat the mega-wealthy liquor magnate Rep. David Trone by a double-digit margin. The general election could be even tougher to pull off.

Moore’s tangled relationship with Hogan runs through the narrative of the current campaign. When Moore ran for governor in 2022, he hailed Hogan as a capable leader with a strong record in Annapolis. Last week, Hogan launched a “Democrats for Hogan” group with a video that made use of Moore’s past comments.

Thousands of Marylanders voted for both men at different times: Hogan won 55 percent of the vote in his 2018 reelection campaign. Moore won 65 percent four years later.

But to help Alsobrooks win the general election, Moore sounds prepared to drive a wedge between his predecessor and the middle-of-the-road Marylanders who like him.

“When I think about the kind of partners that I need, as the governor of a state, you need to have a strong federal delegation, whose values and use and whose principles you believe in,” Moore said. That means Alsobrooks.

“You know, when I first took over as governor, we had no women in our delegation," Moore told POLITICO. Now with three women on the ballot in November, Maryland is "on the cusp" of women making up nearly a third of it.

Hogan's campaign hit Moore for trying to overshadow Alsobrooks.

“How typical for a man to take credit for the hard-fought accomplishments of a woman,” Hogan spokesperson Blake Kernen said in a statement.

Maryland Democrats have confidence in Moore's ability to mend fences and get Alsobrooks to the Senate. Moore will headline a unity breakfast in the suburban Washington, D.C., city of Greenbelt on Thursday morning where Alsobrooks and Trone are both expected to appear, in a gesture to show the bruising campaign is behind them.

“Wes is our leader,” said Malcolm Augustine, a Maryland state senator who was an early supporter of Alsobrooks. “He’s done his part. People believe in Wes in the things that he’s doing and they’re going to believe in and follow Angela.”

Moore can't help but contrast his ability to get Alsobrooks to the nomination against Hogan's inability to shepherd his own hand-picked successor through a recent Republican primary. Instead, Del. Dan Cox won the gubernatorial nomination in 2022, and Moore trounced him by 32 points.

“It’s obvious he does have a coattail problem,” Moore said of Hogan. “He has not been able to get anybody who he has supported across the finish line, and I think that’s obviously weighing heavily on his mind.”