The 2022 Maryland gubernatorial election was held on November 8, 2022, to elect the next governor of Maryland. Governor Larry Hogan, the incumbent two-term Republican, was term-limited and could not seek re-election to a third consecutive term. The Democratic and Republican primaries were held on July 19, with state delegate Dan Cox securing the Republican nomination, while author and former nonprofit CEO Wes Moore won the Democratic nomination. Political observers gave Moore a strong chance of defeating Cox in the general election in this reliably Democratic state where Democrats outnumber Republicans 2-to-1. Shortly after polls closed, several national news organizations called the election for Moore. Moore became the first African-American governor of Maryland after being sworn in on January 18, 2023. This race was also one of six Republican-held governorships up for election in 2022 in a state carried by Joe Biden in the 2020 presidential election, and one of three that voted for Biden by double-digits. Moore flipped six counties that had voted for Hogan in 2018, and his electoral strength largely came from densely populated Prince George's County and Baltimore, where he improved on the margins of 2018 Democratic nominee Ben Jealous by roughly 20 percent. Moore's margin of victory was the highest of any gubernatorial candidate in the state since William Donald Schaefer in 1986. Republican primary Campaign Lieutenant Governor Boyd Rutherford, who was seen as the likely Republican frontrunner in the race, announced in April 2021 that he would not seek to succeed Governor Larry Hogan. Kelly Schulz, the Hogan administration's Secretary of Commerce and former Secretary of Labor, announced her candidacy just hours after Rutherford's announcement. State delegate Dan Cox entered the race in July 2021, and received the endorsement of former President Donald Trump in November. Hogan endorsed Schulz in the primary soon after, setting up a proxy war between Trump and Hogan in the Republican primary. Schulz outpaced Cox in fundraising and had outspent Cox 4–1, but polling showed that the two candidates were running neck-and-neck. In June 2022, the Democratic Governors Association spent $1.2 million for a television advertisement promoting Cox, hoping he would win the nomination and be easier for Democrats to defeat in November. Schulz and Hogan accused Democrats of meddling in the Republican primary, while Cox denied receiving any support from the DGA, saying that he had "nothing to do with the ad purchase". Some observers, including strategist Jim