| Martin O'Malley | |
|---|---|
| O'Malley in 2010 | |
| 61st Governor of Maryland | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office January 17, 2007 |
|
| Lieutenant | Anthony Brown |
| Preceded by | Robert Ehrlich |
| 47th Mayor of Baltimore | |
| In office December 7, 1999 – January 17, 2007 |
|
| Preceded by | Kurt Schmoke |
| Succeeded by | Sheila Dixon |
| Personal details | |
| Born | January 18, 1963 Washington, D.C., U.S. |
| Political party | Democratic Party |
| Spouse(s) | Catherine Curran |
| Children | 2 daughters and 2 sons |
| Residence | Government House |
| Alma mater | Catholic University of America University of Maryland School of Law |
| Profession | Lawyer |
| Religion | Roman Catholicism |
| Signature | |
Martin Joseph O'Malley (born January 18, 1963) is an American Democratic politician who is currently serving as the 61st Governor of Maryland. Previously, he served as the mayor of Baltimore from 1999 to 2007. He is currently the chairman of the Democratic Governors Association.
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O'Malley grew up in the Washington, D.C. suburb of Potomac, Maryland, the child of an attorney. O'Malley attended the Our Lady of Lourdes School in Bethesda[1] and Gonzaga College High School. He went to college at The Catholic University of America, graduating in 1985. Later that year he enrolled at the University of Maryland School of Law in Baltimore, earning his J.D. in 1988 and passing the bar that same year.[2]
In December 1982, while still in college, O'Malley signed on with the Gary Hart presidential campaign for the 1984 election.
In 1986, while in law school, O'Malley was named by then-Congresswoman Barbara Mikulski as her state field director for her successful primary and general election campaigns for the U.S. Senate. He served as a legislative fellow in Senator Mikulski's office from 1987-1988.
In 1988, he began dating his future wife, Catherine Curran, the daughter of the State's Attorney General. Later that year, O’Malley was hired as an Assistant State's Attorney for the City of Baltimore. He would hold that position until 1990.
In 1990, O'Malley, ran for the Maryland State Senate in District 43. He lost the Democratic Primary to John A. Pica Jr. by 44 votes.[3] A year later he ran for a vacant Baltimore City Council seat to represent the 3rd District. He served from 1991 to 1999. As Councilman, he served as Chairman of the Legislative Investigations Committee and Chairman of the Taxation and Finance Committee.
O'Malley announced his campaign for Mayor of Baltimore in 1999. He won the Democratic Primary with over 50% of the vote. He was then elected Mayor of Baltimore in the General election with over 90% of the vote in what was seen as a heavily Democratic city.[4] In 2004, O'Malley was re-elected in the general election with 88% of the vote.
In O'Malley's first year in office, he adopted a statistics-based tracking system modeled after Compstat, a crime management program first employed in the mid-1990s by William J. Bratton and former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani to assist the New York City Police Department. The program aimed to initiate a performance-based system using computerized databases to track targets and results.[5] There is a weekly meeting in which city department managers meet with the Mayor's office and discuss their office's results. According to the office of then Mayor O'Malley, CitiStat has saved Baltimore residents more than $350 million. In 2004, O'Malley's CitiStat accountability tool won Harvard University's Innovations in American Government award.[6] Its success has garnered the attention of delegations from places like England, India, Texas, and others.[7]
During the first Mayoral campaign, O’Malley's made improving public safety a priority. In 2005, Baltimore was ranked the sixth most dangerous city in the United States; in 2006, it was ranked the twelfth most dangerous city.[8]
In early 2005 Maryland Governor Robert Ehrlich fired an aide, Joseph Steffen, for spreading rumors of marital infidelity about O'Malley on the Internet. O'Malley and his wife had previously held a highly publicized press conference to deny the rumors and accuse Republicans of partisan politics. The discussions in which Steffen posted the rumors were initiated by an anonymous user going by the name "MD4Bush", later revealed to be Maryland Democratic Party official Ryan O'Doherty.[9]
In 2002, Esquire magazine named O’Malley "The Best Young Mayor in the Country," and in 2005, TIME magazine named him one of America's "Top 5 Big City Mayors".[10] In August 2005, Business Week Magazine Online named O'Malley as one of five "New Faces" in the Democratic Party. Business Week said that O'Malley "has become the Party's go-to guy on protecting the homeland. The telegenic mayor has developed a detailed plan for rail and port safety and has been an outspoken critic of White House security priorities."[11]
In 2003, national Democratic leaders asked him to give the Democratic Response to the President's weekly radio address in which he spoke about Homeland Security.
During the 2004 presidential campaign, Sen. John Kerry invited O'Malley to speak on the topic in Wisconsin. In 2004, O'Malley was one of the featured speakers at the Democratic National Convention in the FleetCenter in Boston, Massachusetts. In his speech, he focused on Homeland Security stating "Sadly and unforgivably almost three years after that fateful day when thousands of moms and dads, sons and daughters didn’t come home from work on September 11, America's cities and towns, America's ports and borders and America's heartland remain needlessly vulnerable".
O'Malley was nominated by the Democratic Party to challenge incumbent Maryland Governor Robert Ehrlich in the November 2006 election. O'Malley featured the news article "Running early, running hard" [12] on his new web site, launched June 2005. It stated, "O'Malley has yet to officially announce his run for governor, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t been busy on the campaign trail."
O'Malley selected Anthony G. Brown, Delegate from Prince George's County, lawyer, and a 27-year Army veteran, including a tour in the Iraq War, as his running mate. O'Malley was expected to face Montgomery County Executive Doug Duncan in the Democratic primary. Duncan dropped out of the race on June 22, 2006.
In 2004, friends of O'Malley speculated that he might be a presidential candidate in 2012.[13]
O'Malley defeated incumbent Gov. Ehrlich in the November 7, 2006, gubernatorial election by a 6.5% margin.[14]
O'Malley was sworn in as Governor on January 17, 2007. Soon after coming to office, O'Malley closed the Maryland House of Correction in Jessup, Maryland, a notoriously violent maximum-security prison facility.[15]
Governor O'Malley called a Special Session in November 2007 to close a structural budget deficit of $1.7 billion.[16] A structural deficit differs from an actual deficit in that it is based on out-year projected data. In response to this projected deficit for 2008–2009, O'Malley and some Democratic Maryland lawmakers passed and signed the largest tax increases in Maryland history. The plan would raise total state tax collections 14%.[17] A Maryland Senate panel modified the tax proposal, removing "tax breaks for middle- and working-class families."[18][19]
In years past, slot machine gambling has been a heated topic in both houses of the General Assembly. Proponents claim slots could help ease the burden of Maryland's structural deficit. O'Malley's predecessor, Governor Robert L. Ehrlich, Jr. made slot machine gambling a priority from the beginning of his four-year term. However, associated legislation was not passed by the Democrat-controlled legislative branch. O'Malley has said that he supports the implementation of a limited number of slot machines only at horse racing tracks to help sustain the horse racing industry. In November 2008, voters state-wide approved the introduction of slots in Maryland.
In April 2009, O'Malley signed a traffic speed camera enforcement law (Senate Bill 277), a bill which he supported and fought for in order to help raise revenue to try to balance the record deficit facing Maryland. Through strong lobbying by O'Malley, the bill was revived after first having been defeated. After a second vote, the measure barely passed by a few votes. The bill continues to face harsh bi-partisan criticism and has been called a tax on drivers by opponents of the bill. The bill has also sparked a ballot referendum effort sponsored by the not-for-profit group Maryland For Responsible Enforcement.
In September 2009, O'Malley and Elijah Cummings announced the 'Healthy Smiles' dental tour “Together, we have resolved to do everything within our power to prevent avoidable tragedies like the loss of Deamonte Driver, who passed away with an untreated toothache last year,” said Governor O’Malley. “That’s why today, we’re announcing the kick off of the ‘Healthy Smiles’ dental tour to promote awareness and highlight the importance of children’s dental health. With partners like the Deamonte Driver Dental Project and Kool Smiles, we can make oral health services available to Medicaid-eligible and uninsured children in Prince George’s County and throughout the region; and reach out to kids just like Deamonte, ensuring that they will not be turned away from routine but potentially life-saving care.”
In response to the untimely death of Deamonte Driver in February 2007,[20] Governor O’Malley, Secretary Colmers and the General Assembly convened a Dental Action Committee in June 2007 to provide recommendations for Maryland to improve its oral health services. Based upon the Committee’s recommendations, Governor O’Malley put $14 million in the FY09 budget, in state and federal funds, to raise reimbursement rates for dentists treating Medicaid children. The funds target all preventative care and most diagnostic care rates. In addition, Governor O’Malley placed $2 million in his FY09 budget to the Office of Oral Health to initiate and expand dental services in underserved areas in the State.[21][22][23]
O'Malley was elected as the Vice Chairman of the Democratic Governors Association for 2009–2010 while Delaware Governor Jack Markell was chair, and on December 1, 2010, he was elected Chairman for 2010-2011.[24]
Since taking office O'Malley has adapted the CitiStat program he devised for Baltimore and applied it to the state of Maryland. This new program is called StateStat. O'Malley has said that President Obama has looked at StateStat as a potential model for tracking stimulus funding.[25][26]
In a debate during the 2010 campaign, O'Malley referred to illegal immigrants as "new Americans".[27] In May 2011, O'Malley signed a law that would give in-state tuition breaks to illegal immigrants at the state’s colleges and universities.[28] In response, Delegate Neil Parrott created an online petition to suspend the law and have it become a referendum in 2012.[29] The petition drive easily met the first deadline on June 1 with 47,379 signatures accepted by election officials.[30] One month later, the Maryland State Board of Elections verified enough signatures to suspend the law and force a referendum. It was the first time in 20 years that a petition drive has forced a vote on a Maryland law.[31]
O'Malley voiced his support for a bill considered by the General Assembly to legalize same-sex marriage in the state. O'Malley, a Catholic, was urged by Archbishop of Baltimore Edwin O'Brien not to support the bill in a private letter sent two days before O'Malley voiced his support.[32] "I am well aware that the recent events in New York have intensified pressure on you to lend your active support to legislation to redefine marriage," O’Brien wrote. "As advocates for the truths we are compelled to uphold, we speak with equal intensity and urgency in opposition to your promoting a goal that so deeply conflicts with your faith, not to mention the best interests of our society."[32] O'Malley responded, "I do not presume, nor would I ever presume as governor, to question or infringe upon your freedom to define, to preach about and to administer the sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church. But on the public issue of granting equal civil marital rights to same-sex couples, you and I disagree."[32]
O'Malley continues to ensure his Alma Matter, the state's university, the University of Maryland, College Park is funded in its endeavors. In early September 2011, Governor O'Malley guaranteed to make almost $48 million dollars of the total $63 million needed, apart of his projected budget that would be used to help fund the Edward St. John Teaching and Learning Center.[33]
On November 2, 2010, O'Malley defeated Ehrlich in an electoral rematch to win a second term. Despite major losses for Democrats nationwide, O'Malley defeated Ehrlich by a 14-point margin, more than doubling his 2006 margin of victory.
O'Malley is the son of Tom and Barbara O'Malley. The late Tom O'Malley served as a Montgomery County based criminal defense lawyer, and an assistant U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia from 1957 to 1962, among many other positions. The elder O'Malley, a bombardier in the Army Air Forces in the Pacific theater during the Second World War, claimed to have seen the nuclear mushroom cloud rise over Hiroshima.[34]
O'Malley is married to state district judge Catherine Curran O'Malley (Katie). Martin and Katie first met in 1986 while he was working on Barbara Mikulski's primary and general election campaign for U.S. Senator from Maryland; while Katie was working on her father J. Joseph Curran, Jr.'s campaign for Attorney General of Maryland. They began to date in 1988 and were married in 1990 during his first campaign for political office.
They now live in the governor's mansion in Annapolis with their four children, Grace, Tara, Will and Jack. The O'Malleys' two daughters, Grace and Tara, currently attend college.
O'Malley's father-in-law, J. Joseph Curran, Jr., served as Attorney General of Maryland from 1987-2007. Citing his age and his long career, Curran decided not to seek reelection on May 7, 2006, preventing any conflict of interest that might arise in having two close family members at the position of Governor and Attorney General.[35]
According to David Simon, the creator of the HBO drama The Wire, the fictional Mayor of Baltimore Tommy Carcetti is "not O'Malley", but O'Malley was one of several inspirations.[36]
O'Malley appeared in the film Ladder 49 as himself, then-mayor of Baltimore. The History Channel's documentary First Invasion: The War of 1812 featured O'Malley in a segment regarding the British attack on Baltimore in 1814.
O'Malley is a musician. He was active in several bands and solo in the DC and Baltimore areas starting in the early 1980s. He was the vocalist/guitarist/songwriter of Celtic rock band "O'Malley's March" from 1988 to 2005.[37]
| Maryland Gubernatorial Election 2006[14] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
| Democratic | Martin O'Malley | 942,279 | 52.7 | +6.5 | |
| Republican | Robert Ehrlich (incumbent) | 825,464 | 46.2 | -6.5 | |
| Maryland Gubernatorial Election 2010[38] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
| Democratic | Martin O'Malley (incumbent) | 1,044,961 | 56.2 | +14.4 | |
| Republican | Robert Ehrlich | 776,319 | 41.8 | -14.4 | |
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Kurt Schmoke |
Mayor of Baltimore 1999–2007 |
Succeeded by Sheila Dixon |
| Preceded by Robert Ehrlich |
Governor of Maryland 2007–present |
Incumbent |
| Party political offices | ||
| Preceded by Kathleen Kennedy Townsend |
Democratic nominee for Governor of Maryland 2006 |
Most recent |
| United States order of precedence | ||
| Preceded by Joe Biden as Vice President |
Order of Precedence of the United States Within Maryland |
Succeeded by Mayor of city in which event is held |
| Succeeded by Otherwise John Boehner as Speaker of the House of Representatives |
||
| Preceded by Deval Patrick as Governor of Massachusetts |
Order of Precedence of the United States Outside Maryland |
Succeeded by Nikki Haley as Governor of South Carolina |
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