Who do you think will win MoCo county exec?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I’ve been really underwhelmed by the options, but I’m posting because I’ve been very surprised to hear from so many people who work with the Council (through various departments, orgs, businesses, etc.) who I had assumed would be all in for Jawando…but they aren’t.

Some of these are political animals who have been involved in county (or state) politics or otherwise are tapped into “how things work.” This made me think they’d get on the Jawando bandwagon, but nope.

Here’s what I’ve gleaned:

-Jawando is political in the “bad” way (read: easily led astray because he lacks the knowledge to form his own opinion)

-Jawando doesn’t invest 24/7 in educating himself (read: thinks this is just a day job rather than the all-encompassing responsibility it is). He was rarely prepared for meetings or hearings. Even worse: he easily led astray.

-Jawando wants power and a paycheck; he’s not really invested in doing what the job entails.

-Jawando is committed to continuing performative politics when it comes to certain issues. People think he will focus far too much attention on appointments to check the box that will ultimately negatively impact things every voter presumably cares about (think: crime/safety, education, social services, business development, etc.)

-They seem to think Glass is a lot like Jawando, but they didn’t invest much time discussing him since he isn’t considered a real contender.

-They seem to be supporting Friedson even though he doesn’t check all the boxes. They made a lot of similar comments about him being smart, always prepared, and more pragmatic than the others. They still feel like there’s no telling how he would be—but the other two are similarly untested.

Again, I found it surprising that my admittedly (far) left and moderate leaning friends in the loop are secretly not supporting Jawando. The people I’ve consulted on this transcend any singular demographic. The unifier is largely their decades-long work for or with the county and the council.

I’m still not sure who I will vote for, but I’m curious if others are encountering similar views.

Can confirm those who work in politics seem to be largely Friedson supporters. A friend of mine said sadly none of them are great choices, but Friedson is the best to work with because he will actually listen to the people who know what's going on and adapt/adjust to the practical reality of a situation rather than digging deeper into a bad plan/idea.

Not a good look.

+1. The last people I’d want to listen to are people who work in politics. Lots of people who work in politics are also trump supporters. People in politics just care about who will do favors for big donors and give lots of handouts, not who will have the best policies.

Another insider here. Not here they aren't. Trump-type people left county leadership/support long ago.

And insiders are good to listen to in the Executive race, because it's a very different job than just caring about policy. It's managing 10,000 employees and the budget (with MCPS) for 20,000 more.

So managerial skills are key. Effective collaboration with others (Council) is also key. Those strengths and weaknesses vary widely among the top three executive candidates.

How does telling the truth figure into your matrix of managerial skills? Friedson has failed hard on that one. He’s always mislead on his policy proposals (remember that housing for teachers that required a $157k a year salary?). I guess everyone does that a little but his conduct in the election disqualifies him on integrity grounds.

They all lie. A lot. You just haven't noticed or cared about other policy issues.

Even allowing for lying in policy advocacy, neither Will nor Evan has run a dishonest campaign. Andrew has run a negative campaign built on lies. That’s disqualifying.

Mostly agree about Glass. Certainly not about Jawando.

[Anonymous]

More Friedson shenanigans?

https://montgomeryperspective.com/2026/06/14/friedsons-second-tax-mailer/?fbclid=IwdGRjcASc859leHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZAo2NjI4NTY4Mzc5AAEeuX2E9Xb8o5iTJkCqu2tn12FCbWHHGW3B9LGc5EKCaA8vBMEo-8ZhEzZVWos_aem_2Ic-VPAzl7_meJftH_lXLQ

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’ve been really underwhelmed by the options, but I’m posting because I’ve been very surprised to hear from so many people who work with the Council (through various departments, orgs, businesses, etc.) who I had assumed would be all in for Jawando…but they aren’t.

Some of these are political animals who have been involved in county (or state) politics or otherwise are tapped into “how things work.” This made me think they’d get on the Jawando bandwagon, but nope.

Here’s what I’ve gleaned:

-Jawando is political in the “bad” way (read: easily led astray because he lacks the knowledge to form his own opinion)

-Jawando doesn’t invest 24/7 in educating himself (read: thinks this is just a day job rather than the all-encompassing responsibility it is). He was rarely prepared for meetings or hearings. Even worse: he easily led astray.

-Jawando wants power and a paycheck; he’s not really invested in doing what the job entails.

-Jawando is committed to continuing performative politics when it comes to certain issues. People think he will focus far too much attention on appointments to check the box that will ultimately negatively impact things every voter presumably cares about (think: crime/safety, education, social services, business development, etc.)

-They seem to think Glass is a lot like Jawando, but they didn’t invest much time discussing him since he isn’t considered a real contender.

-They seem to be supporting Friedson even though he doesn’t check all the boxes. They made a lot of similar comments about him being smart, always prepared, and more pragmatic than the others. They still feel like there’s no telling how he would be—but the other two are similarly untested.

Again, I found it surprising that my admittedly (far) left and moderate leaning friends in the loop are secretly not supporting Jawando. The people I’ve consulted on this transcend any singular demographic. The unifier is largely their decades-long work for or with the county and the council.

I’m still not sure who I will vote for, but I’m curious if others are encountering similar views.

Can confirm those who work in politics seem to be largely Friedson supporters. A friend of mine said sadly none of them are great choices, but Friedson is the best to work with because he will actually listen to the people who know what's going on and adapt/adjust to the practical reality of a situation rather than digging deeper into a bad plan/idea.

Not a good look.

+1. The last people I’d want to listen to are people who work in politics. Lots of people who work in politics are also trump supporters. People in politics just care about who will do favors for big donors and give lots of handouts, not who will have the best policies.

Another insider here. Not here they aren't. Trump-type people left county leadership/support long ago.

And insiders are good to listen to in the Executive race, because it's a very different job than just caring about policy. It's managing 10,000 employees and the budget (with MCPS) for 20,000 more.

So managerial skills are key. Effective collaboration with others (Council) is also key. Those strengths and weaknesses vary widely among the top three executive candidates.

How does telling the truth figure into your matrix of managerial skills? Friedson has failed hard on that one. He’s always mislead on his policy proposals (remember that housing for teachers that required a $157k a year salary?). I guess everyone does that a little but his conduct in the election disqualifies him on integrity grounds.

They all lie. A lot. You just haven't noticed or cared about other policy issues.

Even allowing for lying in policy advocacy, neither Will nor Evan has run a dishonest campaign. Andrew has run a negative campaign built on lies. That’s disqualifying.

Mostly agree about Glass. Certainly not about Jawando.

Neither Glass nor Jawando has made attacking their opponents with lies a central part of their campaigns. A U.S. Senator and the Council President have both had to call out the Friedson advocacy as untrue and over the line.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Now Andrew Friedson is attacking Will and Evan for voting to raise the recordation tax. I didn’t like that tax increase either.

But here’s the irony: Andrew Friedson and Casey Anderson cooked up a plan to cut impact fees that developers pay and offset those cuts by raising the recordation tax. Friedson sped the impact fee cuts through the council but deferred action on the recordation tax. Because school construction only has two dedicated sources of funding (the recordation tax and impact fees), something had to give later to fund the MCPS capital budget. Friedson wouldn’t support restoring the impact fees so the rest of the council voted to implement the second half of Friedson’s original plan by raising recordation taxes. When school construction costs went up (in part because of a very expensive expansion at Whitman), Friedson gave developers another break on impact fees but didn’t provide any relief on the recordation tax.

This is what you get from Friedson. He talks a good game on taxes, but only developers get tax breaks. Everyone else pays for those tax breaks through higher taxes because government isn’t free. This will be his template as county executive. If having an equitable, progressive tax regime is important to you, vote for Will or Evan.

Nestled in there is the other bit about Friedson. Bethesda (e.g., Whitman) and Potomac will be juuuusssst fiiiiinne. The rest of the county...eh, not so much.

[Anonymous]

Voted this evening for Jawando. Polling place was empty at 7pm. The workers seemed almost too enthusiastic to see a voter walk through the door.

[Anonymous]

What is the deal with data centers? Is anyone actually planning to allow them and not block them? And where would they even go? Any insights?

[Anonymous]

I wanted to like Andrew, but the mailers I get from him, the less I like him.
Def won’t vote for Jawando.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wanted to like Andrew, but the mailers I get from him, the less I like him.
Def won’t vote for Jawando.

Andrew's mailers are annoying. But I don't feel they are indicative of how he acts in his role on the a council.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wanted to like Andrew, but the mailers I get from him, the less I like him.
Def won’t vote for Jawando.

Andrew's mailers are annoying. But I don't feel they are indicative of how he acts in his role on the a council.

Friedson's mailers are disingenuous. Completely indicative of how he acts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is the deal with data centers? Is anyone actually planning to allow them and not block them? And where would they even go? Any insights?

Friedson was for data centers as recently as a couple weeks ago. He is now for a six-month moratorium to figure out the regulations (or more cynically to get him through this election). The regulations will take more than six months because some need to be done at the state level and the general assembly doesn’t convene again until January.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wanted to like Andrew, but the mailers I get from him, the less I like him.
Def won’t vote for Jawando.

Andrew's mailers are annoying. But I don't feel they are indicative of how he acts in his role on the a council.

Friedson's mailers are disingenuous. Completely indicative of how he acts.

They are super shady.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is the deal with data centers? Is anyone actually planning to allow them and not block them? And where would they even go? Any insights?

Glass was the first person to support a moratorium. It was narrowly defeated by a 3-2 committee vote. Jawando conveniently recently proposed a more aggressive moratorium (which Mink has been all over).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is the deal with data centers? Is anyone actually planning to allow them and not block them? And where would they even go? Any insights?

There’s been a proposed one at the ag reserve in Dickerson — not happening anytime soon.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the deal with data centers? Is anyone actually planning to allow them and not block them? And where would they even go? Any insights?

Glass was the first person to support a moratorium. It was narrowly defeated by a 3-2 committee vote. Jawando conveniently recently proposed a more aggressive moratorium (which Mink has been all over).

Jawando announced he was doing a bill in February. Glass introduced a bill in May. The bill that Glass introduced wouldn’t have affected Dickerson, while Jawando’s bill would.

The more important thing is that Friedson has opposed both bills during candidate forums. Friedson has received a lot of help from a super PAC funded by big tech and developers, so it’s not politically possible for him to be strong on data centers. We can’t have Friedson. It has to be Glass or Jawando.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the deal with data centers? Is anyone actually planning to allow them and not block them? And where would they even go? Any insights?

Glass was the first person to support a moratorium. It was narrowly defeated by a 3-2 committee vote. Jawando conveniently recently proposed a more aggressive moratorium (which Mink has been all over).

Jawando announced he was doing a bill in February. Glass introduced a bill in May. The bill that Glass introduced wouldn’t have affected Dickerson, while Jawando’s bill would.

The more important thing is that Friedson has opposed both bills during candidate forums. Friedson has received a lot of help from a super PAC funded by big tech and developers, so it’s not politically possible for him to be strong on data centers. We can’t have Friedson. It has to be Glass or Jawando.

And both leapfrogged over Fani-Gonzalez and Balcombe's ZTA change. They are just opportunists who want their names front and center. They don't care about solutions. Both have known about the data center for years and did NOTHING until an election year.


Yes, they will all allow the data center in Dickerson. Balcombe was going after appropriate regulation. But they will allow it.