Trump's endorsement puts Larry Hogan in a political bind

Former Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) is having to navigate tricky political terrain after Donald Trump endorsed him in the state’s Senate race — arguably a liability for a Republican in the deep-blue state.

Trump told Fox News last week that he would like to see Hogan win, despite the former governor having emerged as one of Trump’s most vocal GOP critics over the last several years.

Hogan has already taken steps to distance himself from Trump since then, including releasing an ad in which he touts his independence, underscoring the difficulty he faces as he squares off against Democrat Angela Alsobrooks in November.

“It more than anything is illustrative of the problem that is going to plague Gov. Hogan throughout this campaign, which is that no matter what he does or what he says to distance himself from Donald Trump, that is always going to be the canopy over which he runs this race,” said Len Foxwell, a Democratic strategist based in Maryland.

Hogan’s decision to run shook up the race to succeed retiring Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) in what otherwise would have been an easy win for Democrats. Hogan won an upset victory to be elected governor in 2014 and comfortably was reelected in 2018, the first Republican to win reelection as the top executive of the state since the 1950s. 

He campaigned both times as a moderate Republican and enjoyed a high approval rating that placed him as one of the most popular governors in the country throughout his tenure. During Trump’s time in office, Hogan emerged as one of the GOP’s most prominent critics of the former president — garnering him plaudits from across the aisle and briefly stirring speculation that he might try to run for president in 2024.

Instead, Hogan made the surprise announcement to run for Senate, a curveball that has given Republicans hope of getting a GOP senator in a blue state and increasing their chances of winning back control of the chamber. 

Since then, Hogan has sought to emphasize his independent streak and convince voters that he would not just automatically side with other Senate Republicans if elected. He has said he would support federal legislation to codify protections for abortion into law and sponsor legislation to protect access to in vitro fertilization (IVF). He has also maintained that Republicans could not count on his vote in the Senate. 

Hogan has also said he will not support Trump in the presidential election. In response to Trump’s endorsement, a Hogan campaign spokesperson told Fox News that the governor “has been clear he is not supporting Donald Trump just as he didn’t in 2016 and 2020.” 

But Democrats say Hogan will have trouble separating himself from the Republican label, and in particular Trump, now that the former president has thrown his support behind him.

“It really does crystallize the arguments that Democrats are going to use against Hogan, which is that a vote for Hogan, whether you like him personally or not, is a vote for Republican control of the Senate and a vote for the Trump agenda,” Foxwell said. 

He said Hogan’s response that he is not supporting Trump was a necessary statement for him to make, but the governor still faces a challenge in a race with national implications beyond Maryland. 

Hogan followed up his response to the endorsement with an ad released Monday in which he did not mention Trump by name but highlighted instances of Republicans acting independently, including late Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) voting against a repeal of the Affordable Care Act and Hogan’s own record responding to the COVID-19 pandemic as governor. 

He said Washington needs “strong, independent leaders” and quoted former President John F. Kennedy in saying “Sometimes party loyalty demands too much.” 

The Hill has reached out to Hogan’s campaign for comment. 

Alsobrooks campaign spokesperson Connor Lounsbury argued that running as an independent voice will be a difficult sell for Hogan. 

“The reason Trump wants Hogan to win is the same reason Hogan wants Hogan to win, is that so they have a majority in the Senate. And I think we all can attest to the fact that the majority controls 100 percent of the agenda, full stop,” Lounsbury said. 

Democrats have also accused Hogan of flip-flopping on abortion, pointing to comments in which he avoided saying whether he’d support bills to codify Roe and protect IVF. They also have pointed to legislation he vetoed as governor to require most insurance plans to cover abortions and lift a requirement that only physicians can perform them and his decision to withhold funding allocated to train new abortion providers. 

“I don’t know what to say besides the record’s pretty loud and clear here,” Lounsbury said. 

Meanwhile, Republicans stress that Hogan can back up his pitch as an independent, and say that platform matters more than Democratic attempts to tie him to Trump. 

Republican strategist Doug Heye, who worked on former GOP Lt. Gov. Michael Steele’s unsuccessful 2006 Senate bid, said Democrats would still try to link Trump and Hogan even if the former president had continually slammed him. He said the same happened in 2006 with Steele being tied to the unpopular President George W. Bush despite Steele’s willingness to criticize the administration. 

“Those Democrats who have voted for Larry Hogan twice, or those independent voters who voted for Hogan twice, they know what Hogan has said, and that is more important to them, I would think, than Trump essentially saying that as a Republican, he supports the Republican candidate,” Heye said. 

Trump’s endorsement of Hogan notably did not come in the same grand announcement made for his other endorsements. He only said he “would like to see [Hogan] win” in a Fox interview and did not make a post on Truth Social that Hogan has his “complete and total endorsement,” as he often does with other candidates. 

Hogan’s campaign has not expanded on its comment about Trump’s endorsement beyond the initial short statement. 

Hogan himself reportedly told Fox in an interview in the spring that Trump having lost Maryland in 2020 by more than 30 points would not be “helpful,” but he expects to “overcome that challenge.” 

Still, Heye said having Trump’s support is better than the criticism Hogan received from Trump surrogates shortly before the endorsement. 

After Hogan said Americans should respect the guilty verdict in Trump’s hush-money case last month, Trump adviser Chris LaCivita wrote in a post on X that Hogan “just ended” his campaign. Republican National Committee co-Chair Lara Trump said Hogan “doesn’t deserve the respect” of anyone in the GOP or the country. 

But Trump’s word is the one that matters, Heye said. 

“This allows him to continue to have that conversation with a very diverse group of folks,” he said. 

State Sen. Justin Ready (R), also a strategist, said Hogan has developed his own “brand” of Republican politics and will benefit from having a record to run on. He said Marylanders will be more able to trust Hogan’s word because of his time as governor compared to if he was just running for office for the first time as a businessman.

Ready noted that Hogan won in 2018, in an otherwise tough year for Republicans nationally.

“I think it's pretty well-established that he's been pretty independent of the national Republican scene, and he’s a Republican, but his focus is on a lot of consensus-based issues,” he said.