Del. Dalya Attar (D-Baltimore City) addresses the Baltimore City Democratic Central Committee Tuesday night before the panel voted to recommend her to fill a state Senate vacancy. (Screen shot)
Baltimore City Democratic Central Committee members voted Tuesday night to recommend that Del. Dalya Attar (D) fill a vacancy in the state Senate, where she would become the first Orthodox Jewish woman to serve if approved by the governor.
Attar prevailed over a fellow delegate, Malcolm P. Ruff (D), and six other Democrats who interviewed over Zoom for the Senate appointment. Five of the eight central committee members from District 41 voted to forward Attar’s name to Gov. Wes Moore (D), while three voted for Ruff.
“That was fun,” said former state Del. Angela Gibson (D), one of the five who supported Attar, after the central committee members met off-camera for seven minutes. Their deliberations followed almost two hours of interviews of the eight candidates.
If appointed by Moore, who has the final say, not only would Attar become the first Orthodox Jewish woman to serve in the state Senate — she has said in the past that she believes she’s the highest-ranking Orthodox Jewish woman ever to serve in elective office in the U.S.
Attar, 34, would replace former Sen. Jill P. Carter (D), who resigned on Jan. 3 after being nominated by Moore to serve on the State Board of Contract Appeals. District 41, in Northwest Baltimore, is perhaps the most diverse in the city — and the outcome of the central committee vote was no sure thing.
Attar, a prosecutor, was elected to the House in 2018. Ruff, who is also an attorney, was appointed to his House seat in 2023.
With Attar’s presumed elevation to the Senate, the central committee will have to meet again to consider candidates to fill her seat in the House, most likely next month. That person would serve alongside Ruff and Del. Samuel I. “Sandy” Rosenberg (D), the most senior member of the General Assembly, who was elected in 1982.
Questioned by the central committee members, Attar and Ruff expressed similar views on how to keep youths out of the criminal justice system and how to close the state’s $3 billion budget deficit by increasing taxes on gambling revenues and cannabis sales. Both also touted their work to ensure that the redevelopment of Pimlico Race Course and the surrounding neighborhood is successful.
And both tried to tread carefully when asked how to navigate the district’s diverse neighborhoods and populations. Attar pledged to host town halls, listening sessions and community events throughout the district, but said she saw common ground in every neighborhood.
“Everyone wants the same thing,” she said. “Everyone wants to live together safely and with the most opportunities for their families.”
Ruff said he knew “the pulse of the district,” and added, “I have the support of this community and I know that I’m the candidate who will get the most done for our community.”
Asked which committee they hoped to serve on in the Senate, Ruff said he saw value in several panels, while Attar said that because education is her top priority, she hoped to be assigned to the Committee on Education, Energy and the Environment.
“If we are not sending our children to Grade-A schools, we cannot blame them for ending up in the [criminal justice] system,” she said.
Assuming she’s appointed, Attar will be in luck — Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) has already signaled that he’ll send the new District 41 senator to the EEE committee, at least for the rest of this legislative session.
In addition to Gibson, the four central committee members who voted for Attar were Lakesha Brown Wright-El, Alex Friedman, Baltimore City Councilmember Isaac “Yitzy” Schleifer and Sandy Rosenbluth. Voting for Ruff: Brian Easley, Dayvon Love and Tammy Stinnett, who is the central committee chair.
The central committee members did not publicly explain their votes.
Gibson, who served as an appointed House member from 2017 to 2019, has the distinction of losing to Attar in the 2018 Democratic primary and being edged out by Ruff the last time there was a vacancy in the delegation. In that case, the central committee was deadlocked between Ruff and Gibson and forwarded both names to Moore for consideration; he chose Ruff.
With this pending appointment, the number of appointed state lawmakers continues to rise. Attar would be the sixth senator to be seated by appointment since the 2022 election (though one has already resigned), and soon a senator from Baltimore County’s 8th District will be appointed.
In the House, a dozen appointees are already serving since the 2022 election, and assuming Attar moves up, there will be two more House vacancies. A third is highly likely, if a delegate is appointed to replace former senator — and now Baltimore County executive — Kathy Klausmeier (D) in District 8.