Martin O'Malley
Martin Joseph O'Malley (born January 18, 1963) is an American lawyer and former politician who served as the 61st Governor of Maryland from 2007 to 2015. A member of the Democratic Party, he was Mayor of Baltimore from 1999 to 2007.
O'Malley ...
to represent District 33 after State Senator Janet Greenip resigned. He then ran and was elected in November 2010 to his first full term.
Background
Reilly graduated from
Essex Catholic High School
Essex Catholic Boys High School (formally known as Bishop Francis Essex Catholic High School after 2000) was a four-year Catholic high school located in Newark and East Orange, in Essex County, New Jersey, United States. The high school opened ...
in
Newark, New Jersey
Newark ( , ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of New Jersey and the seat of Essex County and the second largest city within the New York metropolitan area.Bachelor of Business Administration in banking and finance in 1972 from
Iona College
Iona University is a Private university, private Catholic Church, Roman Catholic university with a main campus in New Rochelle, New York. It was founded in 1940 by the Congregation of Christian Brothers and occupies a campus of in New Rochell ...
in
New Rochelle, New York
New Rochelle (; older french: La Nouvelle-Rochelle) is a city in Westchester County, New York, United States, in the southeastern portion of the state. In 2020, the city had a population of 79,726, making it the seventh-largest in the state of ...
.
Reilly has been a member of the U.S.
Jaycees
The United States Junior Chamber, also known as the Jaycees, JCs or JCI USA, is a leadership training, service organization and civic organization for people between the ages of 18 and 40. It is a branch of Junior Chamber International (JCI) ...
since 1974 and was president of the Park-Adelphi Jaycees from 1976 to 1977 and is a past-president of College Park Jaycees. He is also a volunteer for the
American Cancer Society
The American Cancer Society (ACS) is a nationwide voluntary health organization dedicated to eliminating cancer. Established in 1913, the society is organized into six geographical regions of both medical and lay volunteers operating in more than ...
, and a past-president of the Anne Arundel County Life Underwriters Association. Reilly is a
Nationwide Insurance
Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company and affiliated companies, commonly shortened to Nationwide, is a group of large U.S. insurance and financial services companies based in Columbus, Ohio. The company also operates regional headquarters in Scotts ...
representative and owns his own insurance agency in Crofton, Maryland.
Reilly served on the Anne Arundel County Council representing District 7 from December 2002 to June 2009.
In the legislature
Reilly was selected by the Anne Arundel County Republican Central Committee to replace the retiring Janet Greenip who retired mid-term. He was sworn into the Maryland Senate on June 22, 2009. In 2021, he was elected to serve as the Deputy Minority Leader of the Maryland Senate.
In 2022, the Maryland General Assembly's Joint Committee on Legislative Ethics found that Reilly broke with the standards of the body after he told a constituent he planned to pull a bill they both worked on because she donated to his opponent's campaign.
Despite initially filing to run for re-election, Reilly announced he would not seek re-election to the Maryland Senate on April 18, 2022.
Political positions
Environment
In 2017, Reilly voted to uphold Governor Larry Hogan's veto of a bill to increase the use of
renewable energy
Renewable energy is energy that is collected from renewable resources that are naturally replenished on a human timescale. It includes sources such as sunlight, wind, the movement of water, and geothermal heat. Although most renewable energy ...
in Maryland, saying the bill would levy a "hidden tax" on consumers.
In 2021, Reilly was one of two Republican state Senators to vote in favor of the Climate Solutions Now Act of 2021, a bill that aimed to cut Maryland's greenhouse gas emissions by 60 percent by 2030.
Marijuana
Reilly identifies as an "advocate of
medical marijuana
Medical cannabis, or medical marijuana (MMJ), is cannabis and cannabinoids that are prescribed by physicians for their patients. The use of cannabis as medicine has not been rigorously tested due to production and governmental restrictions ...
". During the 2012 legislative session, he introduced legislation to ban
synthetic marijuana
Synthetic cannabinoids are a class of designer drug molecules that bind to the same receptors to which cannabinoids (THC, CBD and many others) in cannabis plants attach. These novel psychoactive substances should not be confused with synthetic ...
. In 2015, Reilly was one of three Republican members of the Maryland General Assembly to vote for a bill to decriminalize marijuana possession.
Minimum wage
During a debate on legislation to raise Maryland's minimum wage to $10.10 an hour by 2018, Reilly introduced three amendments, including one that would have raised the minimum wage just once to $9 an hour in July 2015. All three amendments were rejected.
Policing
Reilly was the only Republican to vote in favor of the Police Reform and Accountability Act of 2021.
Redistricting
During the 2019 legislative session, Reilly introduced legislation that call for a
ballot initiative
In political science, an initiative (also known as a popular initiative or citizens' initiative) is a means by which a petition signed by a certain number of registered voters can force a government to choose either to enact a law or hold a pu ...
that, if approved, would require the state's congressional districts to be drawn with respect to the boundaries, compactness, and commonality of populations. During the 2021 special legislative session, he introduced an amendment to the state's new congressional redistricting plan that would exchange the maps, drawn by the Legislative Redistricting Advisory Commission, with ones drawn by the Maryland Citizens Redistricting Commission. The amendment was rejected by a vote of 15-32. In 2022, Reilly introduced an amendment to the state's legislative redistricting plan to again swap out the LRAC-drawn maps with those proposed by the MCRC, which was rejected by a 14-32 vote. He later voted against the legislative maps.
Social issues
During a debate on legislation to legalize same-sex marriage in Maryland, Reilly introduced an amendment to change the bill's effective date from October to January 2013, which did not receive a vote. He later motioned to delay the bill to gain more time to prepare amendments. In 2015, Reilly voted against legislation that would allow transgender people to change the gender on their
birth certificate
A birth certificate is a vital record that documents the birth of a person. The term "birth certificate" can refer to either the original document certifying the circumstances of the birth or to a certified copy of or representation of the ensuin ...
s.
In 2013, Reilly was one of two Republicans to vote in favor of a bill to repeal the
death penalty
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the state-sanctioned practice of deliberately killing a person as a punishment for an actual or supposed crime, usually following an authorized, rule-governed process to conclude that t ...
in Maryland.
In 2014, Reilly voted against legislation to outlaw grain alcohol in Maryland, suggesting that the state should work on alcohol education instead of restricting sales of booze.
During the 2021 legislative session, Reilly introduced a resolution calling for "female monthly cycle tracking for adolescent girls" to be added to school health curriculum, which was met with criticism from reproductive health activists who called the proposal invasive and inappropriate. He later withdrew the resolution.
Legacy
The nine-mile portion of
Maryland Route 450
Maryland Route 450 (MD 450) is a state highway in the U.S. state of Maryland. The state highway runs from U.S. Route 1 Alternate (US 1 Alternate) in Bladensburg east to US 50, US 301, and MD 2 near Arnold. MD 450 forms a local complement to ...
from Crofton to Annapolis known as Defense Highway was officially renamed after Reilly on October 25, 2023. Reilly worked on solutions to flooding along the road in 2018 and 2019.