By Doni Glover, Publisher
(BALTIMORE – April 15, 2024) – This has been a very interesting election cycle here in Baltimore as the race for mayor is now in the last 30 days. Initially, Fox Baltimore had Sheila Dixon, the former mayor, a couple of points ahead of Mayor Brandon Scott. That was the pre-Key Bridge Collapse era. Post-collapse, however, finds Baltimore’s youthful chief executive ahead, according to a recent Goucher Poll paid for by the Baltimore Banner.
Although some don’t want to acknowledge it, the incumbent typically has the advantage in an election. Hence, traditional thought has always known that this 2024 mayor’s race was and is Brandon’s to lose.
As for Sheila Dixon, it is my personal belief that she was robbed in 2016 and she was also robbed in 2020 … both times in broad daylight.
I even posed that question to Dixon on the day of her announcement in Upton: What’s to stop Armstead Jones and his influence over the Board of Elections from robbing her again?
In 2016, the Baltimore City Board of Elections had over 1,800 voting irregularities compared to 200 in the 23 other jurisdictions around the state combined. In 2020, a mysterious 10,000 votes appeared for Brandon out of nowhere.
I say it is easier to win the State of Maryland than it is to win Baltimore City. There are just too many slick hands in the water. They don’t call this place Mob Town for nothing.
Be that as it may, I say that right here, right now … Thiru Vignarajah – the only major candidate who stayed actively and publicly engaged with the citizens of Baltimore over the past three and a half years – is in a unique position to shift the election anyway he wants.
With about 11% of the vote according to the latest poll – he could put his support on either Sheila or Brandon and catapult that person to becoming the next Mayor of Baltimore. It’s a no-brainer. That window is only open for the next couple of weeks. Will Vig do it? Will he bow out and put his support on the winner? Time will tell!
