April McClain Delaney (D) in a March 2024 screenshot from her first campaign TV ad; former Del. Neil Parrott (R-Washington) at the State House in 2022. Parrott photo by Bruce DePuyt.
The political committee for U.S. House Republicans on Friday added Maryland’s 6th congressional district to its targeted list of races this fall.
The National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) said the GOP nominee in the 6th, former Del. Neil C. Parrott, is one of six new candidates in its “Young Gun” program, which bolsters Republican challengers or nominees in competitive open-seat districts.
The Young Gun program mentors and supports candidates, providing them with funding and strategic help, and also lays out fundraising and communications benchmarks that they should meet in the run-up to Election Day. The NRCC now has 35 candidates in the program.
“This class of Young Gun candidates’ hard work gives us the ability to go on offense,” said Jack Pandol, a spokesperson for the campaign committee. “Meanwhile, extreme Democrats promise to be a rubber stamp for Kamala Harris’ far-left liberal agenda of higher taxes, open borders and crime-infested neighborhoods.”
But the Maryland Democratic Party on Friday used the occasion of the Young Guns announcement to sound a warning about the national Republicans’ attempts to bolster Parrott.
“By adding Neil Parrott to the NRCC Young Guns list, Speaker Mike Johnson is signaling the elevation of Maryland’s 6th District as a key target in Republicans quest to keep the majority in Congress, funneling money from right-wing billionaires,” said party spokesperson Luca Amayo. “His handpicked candidate, Neil Parrott, will be a MAGA loyalist who will toe the party line and help pass their extreme agenda, which includes a national abortion ban.”
Parrott, who is the Republican nominee for the third straight time in the 6th District, is locked in a tight race with former U.S. Commerce Department official April McClain Delaney (D), as they battle to replace outgoing Rep. David Trone (D) in a district that includes most of Western Maryland and part of Montgomery County. Parrott called his addition to the list “a tremendous honor.”
“With the support of the NRCC and this outstanding program, as a result of recent polling and the voters we are talking with throughout the district, my volunteers and I feel the momentum growing to make positive changes for our country and to bring a practical engineer to D.C.,” he said.
Parrott, a professional engineer, represented Washington County in the Maryland House of Delegates from 2011 to 2023. He was defeated twice by Trone, in 2020, when the district lines were considerably more favorable to Democrats, and in 2022.
Two national nonpartisan political ratings agencies — the Cook Political Report and the University of Virginia Center for Politics — put the 6th District in the “likely Democratic” category, meaning it’s remotely competitive. A third political tip sheet, Inside Elections, gives the race a “safe Democratic” rating.
But without a free-spending incumbent like Trone in the race, Republicans are feeling more optimistic about their prospects — even though Delaney is also personally wealthy and may tap into her fortune as the election approaches. Every recent public poll has shown Delaney and Parrott within the margin of error.
Delaney, meanwhile, launched a TV ad Friday hitting Parrott for voting against a 2021 bill in Annapolis that would have strengthened protections for survivors of domestic abuse and sexual assault. The ad spotlights Megan LeRoux, a domestic violence advocate from Frederick, who says, “Victims of domestic violence come to our shelter for their safety and the safety of their children.”
A narrator speaks next: “Domestic violence is real. And it’s a crime. But Neil Parrott was one of just four who voted for weaker domestic violence laws.”
The ad then features sound from Parrott during a 2022 House floor debate on a similar domestic violence bill: “You just pat them in the wrong way, they take it sexually inappropriately,” he says. “That’s marriage.”
“Both parties fight domestic violence, but not extremist Neil Parrott,” the narrator adds. LeRoux says Parrott “is not someone that women can trust.”
Then Delaney comes on camera, and says, “I will always vote to protect women and children.”