‘Pandering to racial prejudice’ in Baltimore County executive race

The settlement agreement with the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) signed by Baltimore County in 2016 requires the next county executive to introduce legislation next year prohibiting landlords in the county from discriminating against prospective tenants who use federal “Housing Choice” (Section 8) vouchers to help pay the rent.

Al Redmer Jr., the Republican candidate for Baltimore County executive, states that, if elected, he will not introduce the legislation. Mr. Redmer claims that he will defy the agreement because of his opposition to forcing landlords to “go through the additional burdens and bureaucracy of doing business with the federal government.”

But I believe that his real motivation is to assure white voters that he will try to keep more people of color from moving from the Baltimore City to the county. And there is absolutely no chance that voters will miss that message: Fear of poor black families moving to the county has been a pervasive theme in Baltimore County for decades.

The irony is that Mr. Redmer’s friend, fellow Republican and most avid supporter, Gov. Larry Hogan, has gone out of his way to distance himself from the racial divisiveness of the Republican president, Donald Trump. Mr. Redmer has taken the opposite tack, emulating the president by exploiting the fears and prejudices of white voters.