Peter Franchot, who deferred seeking a fifth four-year term as state comptroller to run for governor this year, conceded in the Democratic primary on Friday as results showed he had little chance of catching Wes Moore and Tom Perez in the ongoing vote count.
Franchot, 74, of Takoma Park, won about 20% of the in-person votes in the crowded nine-candidate race and the start of mail-in ballot counting on Thursday showed him gaining about 1% more, with thousands of ballots yet to be counted.
But with Moore, a former nonprofit leader, on top with 35% and Perez, a former U.S. Labor secretary, at 28%, Franchot acknowledged he would not win.
In a statement, he congratulated Moore specifically, saying “it is vital that Marylanders come together to elect a Democrat to be the next governor. I stand ready to ensure this happens and encourage Marylanders to make sure their voices are heard in November!”
“I am proud that despite the tone this election sometimes took, we ran a positive campaign and maintained our commitment to our values. We did not attack or disparage, or seek to anger and divide,” Franchot wrote.
Nearly 638,000 Maryland voters cast ballots in person. Another nearly 509,000 voters requested a mail-in ballot, which they had to turn in by 8 p.m. Tuesday. As of Friday morning, the state elections board reported receiving about 268,000 of those, with more expected to arrive by mail in the next several days. They’ll be counted as long as they were postmarked by the deadline.
Franchot’s loss will end his decades of nonstop service in elected office. Before his first election as the state’s chief fiscal officer in 2006, he served two decades in the House of Delegates.
He was the most experienced candidate in a field packed with Democratic candidates who had lengthy political resumes, and he maintained a narrow lead in the polls throughout the campaign season. But while those polls showed him around 20%, that appeared to be the maximum amount of support he would receive — while Moore and Perez both showed they could grow their bases of support in the final months.
All other candidates had conceded by Friday. Former Attorney General Doug Gansler, who won less than 4% of the vote, said in a statement Thursday that his loss “brings to a close 46 years in politics and elected office.”
Other concessions came from Jon Baron, a nonprofit executive; former Maryland Attorney General Doug Gansler; Ashwani Jain, a former Obama White House official; John. B. King, who was education secretary in the Obama administration; Jerome M. Segal, an author and founder of the socialist Bread and Roses Party, and teacher Ralph Jaffe. Former Prince George’s County Executive Rushern Baker dropped out in early June but remained on the ballot, still winning about 4% of the vote.
In the Republican primary, Del. Dan Cox became the projected winner on Tuesday night, though his opponent, former state Commerce Secretary Kelly Schulz, has not conceded.
