The Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee (MCDCC) nominated its own secretary, Teresa Woorman, on Thursday night to fill a General Assembly delegate seat vacated by now-state Sen. Sara Love (D-Dist. 16).
One of nine candidates for the seat, Woorman, 32, won the nomination after three rounds of voting by the 24-member central committee.
She has been a member of the MCDCC representing District 16 since April 2022, when she was selected by the committee to fill a departing member’s term. She was re-elected to the role by voters in July 2022 and elected secretary by the committee in December 2022.
Woorman’s nomination heads next to Gov. Wes Moore (D), who is expected to appoint the MCDCC’s nominee, who will serve the rest of Love’s unexpired term ending in January 2027. If appointed, Woorman will be required to resign from the central committee to assume the seat in the General Assembly.
In an interview with MoCo360 after winning the nomination, Woorman said she wants to focus on assessing and improving constituent services and hopes that she will be placed on the House Health and Government Operations Committee.
Woorman has worked as a public information officer for the Montgomery County government since 2023, according to her resume. She previously served as County Executive Marc Elrich’s campaign manager and was a chief of staff and legislative director for several Maryland General Assembly members. She was elected in the May 2024 primary election to serve as a delegate to the Democratic National Convention in August supporting President Joe Biden. Also, she is the chair of the board of directors of Pro-Choice Maryland.
Love was nominated for the Senate seat by the MCDCC on June 3 and sworn in on June 14, filling a vacancy created by the departure of Sen. Ariana Kelly (D-Dist. 16). Kelly announced in March that she would be leaving the General Assembly to become executive director of the Maryland Commission for Women. Her resignation from the Senate was effective May 5.
Love’s departure from the House left a vacancy to be filled. The state constitution requires the political party of the lawmaker vacating a seat to nominate a person to fill the vacancy within 30 days after it occurs and to submit the nominee’s name to the governor.
District 16, which includes most of the Bethesda and North Bethesda area, is also represented by Democratic Dels. Marc Korman and Sarah Wolek.
While constitutional, the appointment process has been criticized by some state legislators and good-governance advocates as undemocratic because it offers entry into office without the months of fund-raising, coalition building, campaigning or scrutiny of a traditional electoral effort. Several measures that would have reformed the process were introduced during this year’s General Assembly session, but most of them didn’t make it out of committee.
On Thursday night, Woorman chose to recuse herself from voting since she was running. However, the state constitution does not require central committee members running to fill a vacancy to recuse themselves from participating in the voting process. Committee member Seth Grimes also recused himself from the process because of his status as a lobbyist.
In a tense vote in May 2023, the central committee voted 12-12 not to pass a regulation that would require MCDCC members running to fill a vacancy to recuse themselves from the voting procedures.
The other eight candidates for the seat were:
- Melissa Bender, a former legislative aide for the Maryland General Assembly and former director of government relations for Service Year Alliance;
- Diana Conway, a former president of the Women’s Democratic Club of Montgomery County and an environmentalist;
- Joe Hennessey, a lawyer and former District 16 delegate candidate;
- Jason Nuñez, chief of staff to Prince George’s County Del. Deni Taveras (D-Dist. 47B);
- Steve Shapiro, a U.S. Coast Guard veteran and former federal government employee;
- Amol Tripothi, co-founder and CEO of ELEV8 investment platform;
- Heather Weaver, an Ashburton Elementary School teacher; and
- Scott Webber, a real estate agent and activist.
Before the voting began, the candidates gave opening statements and answered questions from committee members.
The committee conducted three rounds of voting, with candidates being eliminated from each round if they had few or no votes.
Woorman, Bender and Conway made it to the second round. Nuñez and Tripothi each received a vote in the first round and were eliminated. Hennessey, Shapiro, Weaver and Webber did not receive any votes.
In the final round, Bender came in second to Woorman with 10 votes while Woorman secured 14 votes. The committee has 26 members.
Conway and Webber’s candidacies came under a spotlight after a Maryland Matters article about a “whisper campaign” by an unknown individual that distributed 10-year old court documents about a DUI charge against Conway was published Thursday.
In 2014, Conway was charged with driving while intoxicated, two counts of assault and two counts of malicious destruction of property related to an incident at a Frederick County car dealership. She plead guilty.
Conway owned up to the offenses in an interview with Maryland Matters and said the incident is why she sought help for recovering from alcoholism and other mental health issues.
“It was a terrible incident that taught me something and gave me a community that I can turn to at any moment, and I urge others to take advantage of that community,” Conway told Maryland Matters.
During her opening statement Thursday, Conway acknowledged she is in recovery from alcoholism and said if appointed as delegate, she would work on legislation to support Marylanders struggling with substance abuse issues.
Maryland Matters reviewed the court records of the other candidates, finding that Webber had an assault charge against him. Webber told the website that he was involved in “a messy domestic situation” and that he was an “abused spouse.”
Those charges currently have a “stet” status, which means they remain on file but are listed as inactive.
The proportion of Montgomery County’s legislative delegation placed by the appointment process skyrocketed from about 25% (nine members) of the 35-seat delegation to more than 40% (14 members) in 2023. None of Montgomery County’s seats are held by Republicans. The MCDCC was tasked with filling five vacancies after Moore appointed several General Assembly members to his cabinet upon his election in 2022.
The MCDCC has made several appointments for seats representing District 16 in the last couple of years. While Kelly was elected to her initial General Assembly seat as a delegate in 2010, she was appointed by the MCDCC to her Senate seat in 2023 after the departing Sen. Susan Lee was appointed by Moore as Maryland secretary of state.
Wolek was appointed in 2023 to fill Kelly’s delegate seat after Kelly was appointed to the vacant Senate seat.