Martin O’Malley launches populist campaign from embattled hometown

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley with his wife, Katie, at event in Baltimore where he announced that he is entering the Democratic presidential race. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

BALTIMORE — Former Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley launched his presidential campaign here Saturday on top of a knoll overlooking the city’s Inner Harbor. Reachable only by a steep ascent up the hill, the setting served as a fitting reminder that his battle against the presumptive favorite for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton, also will be an uphill one.

O’Malley was the mayor of Baltimore from 1999 to 2007, but that experience came off as a footnote in an address designed less to reflect its setting than to position the candidate as an electable progressive alternative to Clinton running on his record as Maryland governor from 2007 to 2015. The tension between his record as governor and as mayor was evident at his announcement.

O’Malley paused briefly in his Federal Hill speech to lament last month’s “heartbreaking” riots that tore apart sections of his city — sections miles away from the affluent, picturesque neighborhood he chose as a backdrop for the biggest moment of his political career.

As a governor, O’Malley was on the forefront of progressive Democratic legislating, signing into law both a state-based DREAM Act — expanding in-state tuition to the children of undocumented immigrants — and the legalization of gay marriage in his mid-Atlantic state. But as mayor, he imposed a police-crackdown that some have linked to the current tensions between the black community and police in Baltimore, dramatically worsened in April by the police-custody death of 25-year-old Freddie Gray.

On Saturday, a small group of protesters made their way to O’Malley’s presidential announcement to disrupt his speech and to speak to reporters about their resentments relating to his time as mayor and the stricter policing policies he brought to bear in their city. The base of Federal Hill Park, where the public and media entered before ascending to the area where O’Malley spoke, was cordoned off by metal fences and guarded by security, which led to reporters far outnumbering demonstrators inside the secure perimeter.

Tawanda Jones, 36, sister of Tyrone West, who died in police custody in 2013, was among the protesters who attempted to disrupt O’Malley’s speech from inside the park, but behind another series of gates that separated media and credentialed guests from the general public. She told reporters she believed O’Malley’s policies led directly to her brother’s death.

“My brother, who was driving while black in a Mercedes Benz, was brutally murdered, brutally beaten to death. Freddie Gray was brutally beaten to death. I blame him,” Jones, a lifelong Baltimore resident, said of O’Malley.

Though she does not support O’Malley’s candidacy, she said she has not decided who she favors in the presidential primaries and added she was hopeful O’Malley’s presence in the race will bring attention to the issues that have divided the town he still calls home.

In his remarks, O’Malley sought to move beyond the city’s policing issues to a commentary on economic opportunity more in line with what he’d like to be the central narrative of his campaign.