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Maryland state elections, 2006
Maryland state elections, 2010
Template:MD2010Elections
Maryland congressional elections, 2008

The Maryland Congressional elections of 2008 will be held on Tuesday, November 4, 2008, following a primary election on Tuesday, February 12, 2008. The terms of all eight Representatives to the United States House of Representatives will expire on January 3, 2009, and therefore all were put up for contest. The winning candidates will serve a two-year term from January 3, 2009, to January 3, 2011.

[edit] Candidates

[edit] 1st Congressional District

Incumbent Republican Congressman Wayne Gilchrest had been in office since 1991. He defeated Democratic challenger Jim Corwin (official website), a physician and family doctor, in the general election. Corwin defeated fellow Democrats Kostas Alexakis and Christopher Robinson by a comfortable margin in the primary election, while Gilchrest ran for the nomination unopposed.

[edit] 2nd Congressional District

Incumbent Democratic Congressman Charles Albert "Dutch" Ruppersberger (official website) was elected to Congress in 2002. Prior to serving in Congress, Ruppersberger was Baltimore County Executive from 1994-2002. Ruppersberger serves on the House Intelligence Committee and the Democratic Steering Committee. Ruppersberger was challenged by Christopher Boardman in the democratic primary, but easily won renomination.

[edit] 3rd Congressional District

Incumbent Democratic Congressman Ben Cardin, who had served in Congress since 1987, did not seek another term, instead choosing to run for the United States Senate seat being vacated by Paul Sarbanes. Cardin would win the Senate Election.

John Sarbanes (campaign website), attorney and son of Paul Sarbanes, won the Democratic primary in a crowded eight-person race. Peter Beilenson, who served as health commissioner for Baltimore, Maryland, and Paula Hollinger, who served as a State Senator, performed the strongest of the remaining candidates, garnering nearly 50% of the vote between the two.

Sarbanes defeated Republican John White (campaign website), a business executive, who defeated seven other Republican potentials in the primary election. Gary Applebaum, a medical doctor, and Scott Smith, a businessman, performed the best among the runners-up.

[edit] 4th Congressional District

In this heavily Democratic district, the important election was the September 12 primary that pit incumbent Albert Wynn against community activist Donna Edwards. Edwards criticized Wynn for his votes to support the Iraq war, repeal of the estate tax, support of the bankruptcy bill of 2005, and of the Bush Administration's energy bill, arguing that he was too conservative and too closely allied with Republicans. While Wynn was initially heavily favored (he had won over 80% of the vote in each of the past few elections), Edwards showed surprising strength. Two weeks before the primary, The Washington Post endorsed Edwards.

The primary was held on September 12, and when all the votes had been counted, Wynn defeated Edwards by 2,725 votes out of more than 82,000 cast. The final tally of the primary was unclear for nearly two weeks because of widespread voting problems on new electronic voting machines in Montgomery and Prince George’s counties. [1]

[edit] 5th Congressional District

Steny Hoyer (campaign website), the incumbent Democratic Congressman, has served in Congress since 1981, and in 2006 was House Minority Whip and thus the second-highest ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives. He ran unopposed in the Democratic primary, and defeated Green Party candidate Steven Warner (campaign website), a former Navy Seabee who now works for a development company, in the general election. Peter Kuhnert of the Constitution Party mounted a write-in candidacy for the general election and spent under $600.Focusing primarily on how the Bible's stances on abortion and homosexuality differ completely from Hoyer's pro-abortion and pro-homosexual "marriage" positions, Kuhnert became the first write-in candidate in a Maryland congressional race to receive 100+ votes in three different counties.**Convinced that the founding fathers adhered to a strong belief in the God of the Bible, he stirred up much controversy at the end of the campaign by featuring the grisly reality of aborted babies. "I think there should be a candidate that's going to stand up for what God says," Kuhnert proclaimed. With about one million abortions performed each year in the U.S,"That's the real war on terror we should be fighting," he said.(**http://somdnews.com/stories/110306/entemor181003_32135.shtml)

[edit] 6th Congressional District

Incumbent Republican Congressman Roscoe Bartlett (campaign website) has served in the House since 1993. He did not face any major opposition in the Republican primary, winning nearly 80% of the vote. Bartlett defeated Democrat Andrew Duck (campaign website), a stockbroker and U.S. Army veteran, and Green Party candidate Bob Kozak (campaign website), an environmental scientist and businessman, in the general election.

[edit] 7th Congressional District

Incumbent Democrat Elijah Cummings (official website) has served in the House since 1996, and did not face any opposition in the Democratic primary or general election.

[edit] 8th Congressional District

Incumbent Democrat Chris Van Hollen (official website) was elected to Congress in 2002. He easily won the Democratic nomination with over 90% of the vote. He defeated Republican Jeff Stein (official website), an attorney, by a large margin in the general election. Stein won the Republican nomination by a comfortable margin. Also running in the general election was Green Party candidate Gerard Giblin.

[edit] See also