Wes Moore

You know, I think about why I ran for governor.

I had people who were coming up to me before I ever decided to run for any office.

And after one of my mentors, Elijah Cummings, after he died, where they were encouraging me to run for his congressional seat.

He was a dear friend and a mentor of mine.

And I thought about it and I said, you know, that's not what I think I should be doing.

And I love Elijah Cummings and his family and his advisors.

But I just told them, I said, that's not what I think I should be doing.

There was nothing that anyone could have told me to get me to run for Congress.

Fast forward, when I made the decision that I wanted to run for governor.

when I made the decision that I wanted to end child poverty in the state of Maryland, when I made the decision that I wanted to go through this process of being the state's chief executive, there were a lot of people who were in my ear telling me I shouldn't do it, that you can't win, that you're in 13th place, you're pulling at 1%.

This is going to be really bad for you.

There's nothing anyone could have told me to get me not to run.

that my mind was set.

And so I'm very thankful that people around the country are noticing that since I've been the governor, we've seen the fastest drops in violent crime anywhere in the United States of America, that we've added over 35,000 new businesses in the state of Maryland, over close to 100,000 new jobs, that Maryland now has a population that's growing at a faster rate than we've seen in a decade, that Maryland is bucking trends and Maryland is moving.

And I'm thankful that people are taking notice.

But I'm also really excited about running for reelection and and winning winning this November in a way that is not just going to be an election win, but in a way that's going to send a message.

I listen.

I have learned at the pace of the Trump years that March is so far away.

It's too far.

You know, as someone who actually deployed overseas and served my country in combat, to ask these men and women to do a job that they're not trained for is just deeply disrespectful.