Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan takes the oath of office and starts his third presidential term Saturday following his latest election win. Erdogan prevailed in a runoff race last weekend despite a severely troubled economy and his government’s criticized response to a February earthquake that killed more than 50,000 people. The 69-year-old has led Turkey as prime minister or president for 20 years and already is the longest-serving leader in the Turkish republic’s history. His reelection to a five-year term extends his increasingly authoritarian rule into a third decade. Erdogan’s endurance amid a cost-of-living crisis might have resulted from people preferring stability over change as they struggle to pay for basic goods.
Comptroller
Latest election news
The race for western Maryland’s 6th congressional district has two new candidates, including a Frederick County resident and a Montgomery County state delegate.
Former Vice President Mike Pence will officially launch his widely expected campaign for the Republican nomination for president in Iowa next week. That adds another candidate to the growing GOP field and puts Pence in direct competition with his former boss, Donald Trump. Pence will hold a kickoff event in Des Moines on June 7, the date of his 64th birthday, according to two people familiar with his plans who spoke on condition of anonymity to share details ahead of the official announcement. He’ll also release a video message as part of the launch.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has entered the 2024 presidential race with an announcement plagued by technical glitches. He’s stepping into a crowded Republican primary contest that will test his national appeal as an outspoken cultural conservative and the party’s willingness to move on from former President Donald Trump. DeSantis tried to announce his bid in a special Twitter feed that turned disastrous. Listeners could hear almost nothing distinguishable for nearly half an hour. He never mentioned Trump in the session that lasted about an hour but said he was ready to fight. “Buckle up when I get in there,” he said.
The field of Republican presidential hopefuls grows larger by the week. But do any of them stand a chance of beating Joe Biden next year?
Democratic Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware says he will not seek reelection to a fifth term in the U.S. Senate. Carper announced Monday that he will retire when his current term expires in 2024. His announcement paves the way for a wide-open contest for the seat he has held since 2001 in heavily blue Delaware. He is the fourth Democratic senator to announce plans to retire in this coming cycle. Carper served five terms in the U.S. House and two terms as governor before being elected to the Senate in 2000. In the Senate, Carper built a reputation as a moderate lawmaker and a champion of environmental protection and the U.S. Postal Service.
Mutual supporters of Sen. Tim Scott and former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley are in a conundrum now that the two South Carolina natives are both candidates for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination. The two have a long history: They worked alongside each other in the state House, and then-Gov. Haley appointed Scott to a Senate seat in 2012. For his part, Scott has dismissed any awkwardness, saying they will remain friends. Haley has declined to comment on Scott when asked by The Associated Press.
Members of a committee considering changes to Frederick’s city charter heard Thursday from a veteran member of the Frederick County Council about the county’s process for considering legislation.
Some well-known political names in Frederick County said they don't plan to run for the county's congressional seat, which will be open next year as U.S. Rep. David Trone runs for the U.S. Senate.
A special prosecutor has ended his four-year investigation into possible FBI misconduct in its probe of ties between Russia and Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign. The report Monday from special counsel John Durham offers withering criticism of the bureau but a meager court record that fell far short of the former president’s prediction he would uncover the “crime of the century.” It represents the long-awaited culmination of an investigation that Trump and allies had claimed would expose massive wrongdoing by law enforcement and intelligence officials. Instead, Durham’s investigation delivered underwhelming results, with prosecutors securing a guilty plea from a little-known FBI employee but losing the only two criminal cases they took to trial.
Election integrity and Pennsylvania’s mail-in voting law are prominent subjects in the state’s Republican primary contest for an open state Supreme Court seat, as Donald Trump continues to baselessly claim that the 2020 election was stolen. This year, two GOP primary rivals for state Supreme Court in Tuesday's primary election are signaling their disapproval of Pennsylvania’s expansive mail-in voting law. In one appearance last month, Carolyn Carluccio, a Montgomery County judge, called the mail-in voting law “bad” for the state and for faith in elections. Meanwhile, Patricia McCullough, a judge on the statewide Commonwealth Court, repeatedly highlights her rulings in election-related cases, including voting to throw out the mail-in voting law.
The Supreme Court has agreed to decide whether South Carolina’s congressional districts need to be redrawn because they discriminate against Black voters. The justices said Monday they would review a lower-court ruling that found a coastal district running from Charleston to Hilton Head was intentionally redrawn to reduce the number of Black Democratic-leaning voters to make it more likely Republican candidates would win. The case probably will be argued in the fall, and decided in the run up to the 2024 elections, when all the seats in the closely divided House of Representatives, now under Republican control, will be on the ballot.
The seditious conspiracy convictions of former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and three lieutenants bolsters the Justice Department’s high-profile wins in its historic prosecution of the Capitol attack. The verdict handed down Thursday could further embolden the Justice Department and special counsel Jack Smith as his team investigates efforts by former President Donald Trump and his allies to undo President Joe Biden’s victory. Smith’s work is now proceeding rapidly. Just last week, a federal grand jury heard hours of testimony from former Vice President Mike Pence. Trump loomed large over the monthslong Proud Boys trial at the U.S. Courthouse in Washington, where the Capitol can be seen in the distance from the windows.
The day Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis took office, he vowed to pursue an agenda that would heal the state’s political divisions. On Friday, four years later, DeSantis concluded a legislative session establishing him as perhaps the most accomplished conservative governor in the nation’s culture wars. The leading rival to former President Donald Trump in the 2024 Republican presidential campaign has pushed the limits of divisive cultural battles and in most cases has won — backed by Republican supermajorities in Florida’s legislature. The moves position DeSantis well among primary voters but spark concerns among others in the party who fear his dogged pursuit of conservative cultural priorities may further divide the nation.
Republican members of the Oregon Senate have extended their boycott into a second day, delaying bills on gun safety, abortion rights and gender-affirming health care. The stayaway prevented a quorum, a tactic that minority Republican lawmakers have used in the past. But this time — if they continue to stay away — they’ll be testing a new law that was passed overwhelmingly by Oregonians in a ballot measure last November. That law bans lawmakers who have 10 or more unexcused absences from running for reelection. The boycott comes as several statehouses around the nation have been battlegrounds between conservatives and liberals.
The committee reviewing possible changes to Frederick’s charter is expected to make recommendations to the mayor and aldermen by Thanksgiving, although details still need to be worked out.
Maryland’s State Board of Elections kicked off the search Thursday for the state’s first new elections administrator in over 25 years.
Jason Evans, Karl Munder and Tim Washabaugh were elected to the Mount Airy Town Council on Tuesday night, an election official said.
The members of Maryland’s delegation to District 3 in the General Assembly will continue to look at ways to regulate guns in the state, they told constituents at a meeting Sunday.
Betsey Whitmore Brannen was elected to the Walkersville Town Commission on Tuesday night, according to unofficial results, making the council whole again after months of vacancies.
Development, business and public safety were the central topics of a Walkersville forum on Saturday, where four candidates running to fill former Commissioner Michael Bailey’s vacant seat pitched themselves to voters.
Four people are running in Walkersville’s second special election this year to take the seat of former Commissioner Michael Bailey.
Five candidates running for three seats opening on the Mount Airy Town Council in May promised on Tuesday, if elected, to slow local development and prioritize municipal water issues.
A committee evaluating possible changes to Frederick’s charter will hear from its first witnesses at its next meeting, to discuss election issues.
The City of Frederick is taking a deep dive into its charter, considering a series of reforms.
