Maryland Gov. Wes Moore said state surplus 'wasn't real.' His budget said otherwise

Carson Swick, The Baltimore Sun on Mar 28, 2025

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BALTIMORE — Maryland Gov. Wes Moore raised some eyebrows this week by saying the state’s $5.5 billion budget surplus “wasn’t real,” after describing the state’s “fortunate financial position” at the beginning of his term.

Speaking to reporters in Annapolis as the current legislative session winds down, Moore pointed to the evaporation of temporary federal COVID-19 funding to explain Maryland’s transformation from surplus to $3.3 billion structural deficit.

“When you have a one-time infusion of cash, that is not structural surplus,” the Democratic governor said. “That is not math. It’s politics, it’s not math. It’s dark-money gaslighting.”

Moore’s first budget proposal showed the state expected to end fiscal year 2023 with more than $5 billion in general cash reserves while acknowledging that COVID aid would be drying up.

“If the State’s current revenue projections hold through June, we anticipate ending the current Fiscal Year 2023 with a more than $2 billion General Fund balance and an additional $2.9 billion in the Rainy Day Fund — $5 billion in combined General Fund cash reserves,” Moore’s proposal reads. “At the same time, Maryland, like many other states, sees a surplus created by a series of rare financial tailwinds unlikely to continue.”

While the governor’s office did not specify how much of this $5 billion was directly related to COVID-19 funds, a Maryland Department of Legislative Services report estimates the state received about $4.9 billion in pandemic aid from the federal government.

In Moore’s fiscal year 2024 budget, on page 14, he described proposing a budget with “a robust surplus balance” and was also aware of economic risks, revenue risks and state retirement contributions.

Carter Elliott, Moore’s senior press secretary, says the deficit has been predicted since 2017 and exacerbated by slow economic growth across multiple administrations.

“During that time the state’s economy also significantly underperformed the nation, growing at just 3% while the nation grew at 11% between 2017 and 2022,” Elliott said in an emailed statement.

Moore’s Republican predecessor, Gov. Larry Hogan, criticized the “BS and finger-pointing” surrounding budget issues in a series of X posts Thursday. Hogan’s posts balked at the Moore administration characterizing Maryland’s economy as weak.

“Even after managing a global pandemic, we left office in January 2023 with the largest surplus in state history — $5.5 billion,” Hogan wrote. “Maryland had never been in a stronger economic position.”

Hogan continued by referencing a recent University of Maryland, Baltimore County, poll he interpreted as the state being on the wrong track.” The poll showed that 52% of Marylanders approve of Moore’s job performance, 53% also said they have considered moving out of state in the coming years.

“It’s a damn shame, and it breaks my heart,” Hogan said of the poll and overall budget situation.

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