Maryland’s 6th Congressional District, with the state’s only competitive House seat in November’s general election, stretches from Gaithersburg and Germantown in liberal Montgomery County to Frederick, Hagerstown and Cumberland in the conservative western panhandle. Democrat John Delaney flipped the seat in 2012 by defeating longtime Republican incumbent Roscoe Bartlett. Rep. David Trone (D) won in 2018 when Mr. Delaney stepped aside for a presidential bid. With Mr. Trone running for the U.S. Senate, April McClain Delaney — the former congressman’s wife — is the best choice for Democrats in the May 14 primary.
She is an empathetic and effective pragmatist. As deputy assistant secretary of commerce under President Biden, Ms. Delaney helped lead the rollout of the $65 billion program to connect all Americans to the internet, especially in rural areas. The daughter of an Idaho potato farmer, she met her husband at Georgetown law school and practiced media law until founding in 2006 the Washington office of Common Sense Media, a nonprofit focused on children’s television programming and online safety. She advocated stronger online privacy protections and developed a K-12 curriculum for “digital citizenship” that’s now widely used.
We’re confident she would quickly emerge as a leader in the House on formulating sensible regulations of Big Tech, designing what she calls “bumpers and safeguards” that wouldn’t undermine American innovation.
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Her leading rival for the Democratic nod is state Del. Joe Vogel. Just 27, he graduated from college in 2018 and worked on Sen. Cory Booker’s 2020 presidential campaign. Mr. Vogel leans on his identity as an openly gay Gen Zer who emigrated from Uruguay as a child. He has secured endorsements from organized labor, the Sierra Club and LGBTQ+ groups. But he’s not experienced enough for Congress.
Follow this authorEditorial Board's opinionsHe has unfairly attacked Ms. Delaney for being friendly with Republicans, including Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. Voters should want representatives who are willing to work across the aisle, something Ms. Delaney proved she could do at Common Sense Media and that Mr. Trone has done during his three terms.
The rest of the crowded Democratic field contains some notable local and state leaders, but none as impressive as Ms. Delaney, whom major national Democrats such as former speaker Nancy Pelosi and Rep. Jamie Raskin, Montgomery County’s other representative, have backed.
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On the Republican side, the best choice is former F/A-18 pilot Tom Royals, who works in IT sales. He applied to the U.S. Naval Academy after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and flew combat missions over Afghanistan and Iraq. He and his wife are raising nine children, from high schoolers to toddlers, in Germantown. Mr. Royals says he knows from personal experience that “a strong America is good for the world” and “it’s not in our interest to have Ukraine overrun.” He is noncommittal about whether he would have voted for Congress’s recent supplemental funding package to save Ukraine but pledges to work with GOP leadership and strongly support U.S. allies. That such triangulation is necessary is a sad reflection of the isolationist streak inside today’s Republican Party. He’s also evasive about whether he would vote for a federal ban on abortion. But he calls Mr. Biden “the duly elected president.”
Mariela Roca, an Air Force veteran who specializes in medical supply-chain logistics, is running a more robust campaign than two years ago but says she’s “closer to a no” on the Ukraine funding package. Del. Neil Parrott, a pleasant and principled conservative whom we endorsed in this race in 2022, also declines to say whether he would vote for Ukraine aid.
The worst GOP candidate is former delegate Dan Cox, who continues to peddle the lie that Donald Trump won the 2020 election. He filed articles of impeachment against then-Gov. Larry Hogan (R), this year’s likely GOP nominee for the Senate, over pandemic lockdowns. After losing the 2022 governor’s race by 32 points, he became chief of staff to failed Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate and fellow election denier Doug Mastriano. Mr. Cox vehemently opposes any funding to Ukraine, decries bipartisanship and suggests his opponents are part of a “globalist cabal.”
Depending on what Democratic and Republican primary voters do, this November’s general election in Maryland’s only potential swing district could be a contest of two candidates who suit an ideologically diverse district — or a dismal partisan brawl.
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