Prior to the start of today’s fiscal briefing with the Spending Affordability Committee, the House Appropriations Committee, the House Ways & Means Committee, and the Senate Budget & Taxation Committee, House Republicans issued the following comments about Maryland’s projected $1.4 BILLION deficit.
“Governor Moore has suggested repeatedly – albeit falsely – that under his leadership, Maryland Democrats turned a budget deficit into a surplus by enacting the single largest tax increase in Maryland’s history,” said House Minority Leader Jason Buckel. “Sadly, this report shows that there is no new surplus and never was, that the increased taxes and fees Marylanders are paying just went for more government workers and more government spending, and that there is nothing ahead for us fiscally except a sea of red ink and billions of dollars in deficits. Today’s report reveals what a complete disaster total Democratic control of Maryland’s budget and taxation policies has become for our state.”
“The political expediency of the Moore Administration blaming others for our state’s fiscal woes is getting old,” said House Minority Whip Jesse Pippy. “There is no doubt that federal actions impact Maryland, but the degree to which that is true is a direct result of the Democratic leadership’s overreliance on Government spending, while systematically destroying the private sector. If we look across the Potomac River to our neighbors in Virginia, whose proximity to Washington, D.C., makes them vulnerable to federal actions, but whose private sector growth has financially insulated them from most federal actions. The state currently has a $2.2 BILLION surplus going into the next budget year and has provided billions in tax cuts to Virginians.”
“I think the bottom line here is Marylanders have nothing left to give,” said Delegate Jeff Ghrist, the Ranking Republican member of the House Appropriations Committee. “The Democratic supermajority continues to take, with historic increases in taxes and fees and an insatiable appetite for spending. Meanwhile, the government continues to grow, so the problem only gets worse. As massive as a $1.4 BILLION deficit is, the long-term projections to pay for the Blueprint in the coming years are staggering. We knew this in 2020 when the Blueprint bill passed. The truth is, no matter who is in the White House, it was always going to be this way.”
Office of Policy Analysis (2025, November 12). Department of Legislative Services, “Spending Affordability Briefing”, https://dls.maryland.gov/pubs/prod/operbgt/25_Spending_affordability_briefing.pdf
Pryor, R. (2025, May 15). Fox 45 Baltimore, “Governor Moore blames Trump for bond rating downgrade; critics point to state spending”, https://foxbaltimore.com/news/local/maryland-bond-rating-downgrade-trump-moody-rating-budget-shortfall-wes-moore