Note: The article below lists Del. Mark Fisher as being a representative from St. Mary’s County. Fisher represents Calvert County.
This article was republished with permission from WTOP’s news partners at Maryland Matters. Sign up for Maryland Matters’ free email subscription today.
Gov. Wes Moore said the fiscal 2026 budget needs to give a tax break to middle-class taxpayers, but he sidestepped questions on whether the plan currently steaming through the legislature provides meaningful relief.
Lawmakers have just over a week to finalize a $67 billion spending plan that includes $2 billion in cuts and $1 billion in new taxes. The plan includes meager – on average — income tax cuts for most individuals while raising taxes in a range of other areas.
“While we are working through all the final details, I’m very clear about what I want the conclusion to be, right?” Moore told a gathering of reporters Friday. “The conclusion is the middle class needs to get a tax cut, that we’ve got to give more breathing room to middle class, more than this currently, across the board. We’ve got to make sure that the middle class are getting more financial support, right?”
Lawmakers are racing against the clock to finish the budget by April 7, the last day of the 2025 session.
The House on Wednesday passed its version of the budget, and the Senate is expected to begin debate Monday, with an eye toward finalizing its work by midweek. That will allow lawmakers to go to a conference committee to work out their differences and have a final budget by April 7.
During the conference committee meeting, lawmakers are expecting a second supplemental budget from Moore that includes nearly $100 million in additional cuts the legislature asked the governor to make.
When asked to reconcile the $1 billion in new taxes in the House and Senate versions of the budget with his “North Star” priority of bringing economic relief to the middle class, Moore focused on income tax relief.
“And so, when I hear things like, you know, who are we fighting for? The answer is pretty clear,” Moore said. “We’re fighting for middle-class families, and we’re fighting to make sure the middle-class families and working families can get a little extra financial breathing room.”
Moore repeatedly pointed to his tax plan — which was watered down by the General Assembly.
The plan, as it stands, will provide a meager tax cut to some middle-class taxpayers. An estimated 94% of taxpayers would pay less or see no change in their state income taxes under the plan while so-called high earners, those earning $500,000 or more, would pay more after being shuffled into two newly created tax brackets.
The House plan also eliminated Moore’s proposed corporate tax cut. The governor proposed lowering the rate from 8.25% to 7.99% in two years, contingent on the adoption of combined corporate income tax reporting. The House adopted combined reporting, but nixed the rate reduction.
“I think it’s necessary, and I think that it actually coincides with so many of the other things that we are doing to make Maryland more economically competitive,” Moore said in a separate meeting Friday with broadcast reporters. Audio from that meeting was shared with Maryland Matters by Fox45.
Republicans said the income tax cut is not significant and is ultimately gobbled up by other tax and fee increases in the budget.
For those who get a tax break, the average amount would run between $50 and $60, about one-third of what was in Moore’s January budget proposal.
But the budget also contains a number of tax increases including a tax on IT and data services that will hit consumers and businesses alike. Other new taxes include a 6% sales tax on vending machine purchases, a tax on rental cars, an increase in the sales tax on car sales and faster implementation of higher vehicle registration fees passed in 2024.
“We think it’s still a net more than it is a net less for taxpayers,” said Senate Minority Leader Sen. Stephen S. Hershey Jr. (R-Upper Shore). “He’s only looking at one side of the ledger and saying we reduced personal income tax rates here, rather than acknowledging that they’ve raised taxes and fees on the other side.”
Senate Budget and Taxation Chair Sen. Guy Guzzone (D-Howard) cast doubt on any late attempts to increase the size of a tax cut in the final days of the session, however.
“The budget is very tight,” he said.
Moore is also taking heat from some quarters over the services sales tax. The $500 million that will be raised by the data and IT services tax is part of an effort to offset part of a $3 billion deficit in the coming fiscal year.
Moore did not propose the tax, and had hinted at a veto if it affected businesses only. But a deal announced last week with Senate President Bill Ferguson (D-Baltimore City) and House Speaker Adrienne Jones (D-Baltimore County) said the tax would be levied on both businesses and consumers.
Del. Mark Fisher (R-St. Mary’s) Wednesday had a message for businesses.
“Don’t move into Maryland, and if you have a small business or a medium-sized business, get out of Maryland now,” Fisher said during House debate on the budget. “The Democrat Party sees you as an ATM machine, and they will never stop until such time as they have the perfect socialist government that will then collapse upon itself, because there is no revenue left.”
Moore, in his meeting with broadcast reporters Friday, called the comments “embarrassing and disappointing,” and called on Fisher to apologize to Marylanders and residents of Calvert County.
“This is what people hate about politics, that you’re willing to root against your hometown for political purposes, for click bait,” Moore told the broadcast reporters.
“I just think it’s embarrassing for him, and frankly, if he doesn’t believe in the state, if he doesn’t believe in his constituents, if he doesn’t believe in the democratic process and in having open debates, then I don’t know why you are in a seat … because the Marylanders I know, they believe in Maryland. They root for Maryland, and they want to support Maryland,” he said.
When asked for comment Thursday, Fisher shared a link to a video he posted on social media.
“Why do people want to leave, Wes Moore?” Fisher asked in the video. “They want to leave because all they see is it being harder and harder to live in Maryland.”
Concerns are not coming strictly from Republicans.
Del. Brian M. Crosby (D-St. Mary’s) is not only the vice chair of the House Economic Matters Committee, he’s also a military veteran and a small business owner involved in defense industry IT contracts.
He checks a number of boxes when it comes to Moore’s priorities and North Star values, including being a veteran and a small-business owner in the technology industry.
Last week, Crosby moved much of his physical business out of Maryland. He plans to reincorporate in Georgia, where he has a warehouse, to avoid the tech tax in the budget, which he said would bankrupt his business.
Moore, when asked about the move, insisted Crosby’s business remains “a Maryland business.”
“We’re making historic investments in the business community, and also in industries like the one that Brian is a part of,” Moore told print and radio reporters. “So, I know that we have worked with the business community. We have worked with individual Marylanders, and we know this is a deeply responsible budget that we’ve landed on, and one that we think that the people of the state will appreciate.”
