Why We’re Running: A Real Alternative for Maryland
Marylanders deserve a government that solves real problems—housing, healthcare, schools, transit, clean air and water—not another round of two-party trench warfare. The current system concentrates power, narrows debate, and blocks practical solutions. We’re running to change the incentives: to open Maryland’s politics to more voices, more ideas, and better outcomes.
The two-party system is destroying our country and our state.The modern two-party system was designed after world war II so that two non-ideological parties could work together for the good of the country . This system was flawed from the start, but it tried to set guardrails to keep us from descending into polarization, inequality, and ideological conflict. The two parties have driven us through those guardrails, and now we are in an ever worsening doom loop.
Unlimited money in politics, hyper-partisan primaries, polarized national elections, and suppression of alternative parties have turned every election into a life or death struggle between two mortal enemies seeking only to stop the other party from holding power.
Voters are sick of the two parties, want more choices, and better outcomes.
Polls consistently show how dissatisfied Americans are with the two parties, people want more choices, Independents are the fastest-growing segment of the electorate in the United States and Maryland, and many voters have just dropped out of politics altogether. The issues that are most important to Marylanders, from economic opportunity and affordable housing to reliable healthcare, quality education, energy, and the environment, are impossible to address in the current system. The two parties are too busy fighting each other or protecting their power to solve the problems
We have a crisis of democracy in Maryland, and State government is entirely unresponsive to voters.
Most Maryland voters have very little say to determine their present or future. Most residents live in counties or districts, where one party controls the vast majority of elected offices, and elections are determined in the primary. One quarter of the General Assembly is appointed, not elected, and the decades-long Democratic Party supermajority makes politicians in both parties responsive to donors, party leaders, and national narratives. Despite that power(or because of it), Democrats have been unable or unwilling to address sky-high rental eviction rates, incarceration patterns, and economic inequality.
A Case for Multiparty Democracy
More parties mean more ideas on the table, more communities represented, and more room for pragmatic compromise. When multiple parties must work together, budgets and legislation reflect a broader public—not just a faction.
More parties in power increase the chance for compromise and collaboration. When there are more voices representing more communities, resources are distributed more equitably, and opportunities increase for everyone.
Multiparty democracies are more collaborative. A multiparty system will not solve all that ails our democracy, and it cannot single-handedly abolish big money influence, but it can be better. More Justice, more democracy, more peace and a better approach to the climate, environmental, and inequality crisis are possible. This campaign is about building that future.
Why the Green Party
The Maryland Green Party has been on the ballot for 25 years. We have run over 130 races for state, local, and federal offices. We have run candidates that raise issues ignored by the Democrats and Republicans, we have challenged corruption, we have provided an antidote to the complacency of one party rule. We have protested, picketed, and organized, and we have won about a dozen races.
We have one of the longest surviving third parties in Maryland and in American history. We are part of a grassroots national movement that has existed in nearly every state and has elected over 1600 people nationwide since 1985.
From the beginning, we have been saying that we are in it to effect real change, from the bottom up.
Right now, is when Maryland needs the Green Party the most. It needs the Green Party to shape budgets and legislative agendas supporting communities, not campaign contributors. It needs the Green Party to challenge incumbents who never have a challenger, and politicians who ignore their constituents. It needs the Green Party to fight for democracy and voting rights, not party bosses and national narratives.
Maryland needs housing, education, and healthcare established as rights and not luxuries. Maryland needs a party that recognizes and stands by the truth, that reparations are real, not symbolic. Maryland needs a Green Party that stands for climate and environmental policies that force polluters to pay instead of communities.
Maryland needs a party that will change the game, not promise more of the same.