Democratic governors from four states will gather at Churchill Downs this Saturday as guests of Kentucky’s governor. Maryland’s governor is not among them — at a race now owned by the company that controls the Preakness Stakes.
By Michael Phillips | MDBayNews
This Saturday, as the 152nd Kentucky Derby runs at Churchill Downs, Democratic governors from North Carolina, Virginia, New Mexico, and Michigan are set to watch from prime seats as personal guests of Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear. Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, according to publicly available information, is not among them.
That absence would be unremarkable in any other year. This year, it lands differently.
Churchill Downs — the Louisville company that owns and operates the Kentucky Derby — holds the intellectual property for the Preakness Stakes, acquired from 1/ST Racing for $85 million. Maryland, meanwhile, has committed roughly $450 million in state funds toward the reconstruction of Pimlico Race Course. Taxpayers here are financing the physical plant. Churchill Downs owns the brand that will run in it.
It is also worth noting what the Kentucky Derby has become on the national political calendar. Beshear has transformed Derby weekend into a Democratic Governors Association fundraising showcase, with ticket packages carrying price tags of $15,000 per person. The governors who will be at Churchill Downs this weekend — including Michigan’s Gretchen Whitmer, widely regarded as a leading 2028 presidential contender — represent exactly the kind of national party gathering that Moore, himself frequently named in 2028 speculation, has spent the past year deliberately seeking out. He has been to South Carolina fish fries, The View, and battleground-state commencements. This room, apparently, he is sitting out. Moore and Lt. Gov. Aruna Miller have scheduled the kickoff of their reelection campaign for Saturday — rallies in Baltimore City and Prince George’s County, running on the same afternoon as the Derby.
Maryland is paying to build the track. Churchill Downs owns the race. And Maryland’s governor isn’t at the table — at either venue.
When Beshear publicly announced that a “big group” of Democratic governors would join him at Derby 152, the named guests were Josh Stein of North Carolina, Abigail Spanberger of Virginia, Michelle Lujan Grisham of New Mexico, and Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan. Moore’s name does not appear in the announcement.
It is worth noting that Beshear’s full Derby guest list is deliberately shielded from public view. The governor routes his ticket allotment through a private nonprofit called First Saturday in May Inc., which is not subject to Kentucky’s Open Records Act. Beshear’s office has repeatedly confirmed it keeps no records of who receives tickets. Moore’s absence is documentable from the public record — not from any complete accounting of who attends. He may have been invited and declined. Either way, the optics are the same.
The February Contrast
The timing adds a layer that the calendar did not have to provide. In February, Beshear made national news by announcing he would boycott the White House governors’ dinner because the Trump administration declined to invite Moore — calling Moore a personal friend and framing the exclusion as petty political retribution.
“Wes Moore is a friend of mine,” Beshear said at the time. “I certainly ain’t going if he’s not invited.”
The solidarity was genuine and widely covered. The irony now is that three months later, Beshear is hosting a curated gathering of Democratic governors at the most prominent social event in American horse racing — and Moore is not publicly among the invited.
No one is accusing Beshear of a deliberate slight. Party dynamics, logistics, and the deliberate opacity of his ticket operation make clean conclusions impossible. But the governor who most loudly defended Moore’s right to a seat at the table does not appear to have extended one of his own.
What Maryland Is Actually Getting From This Arrangement
The Preakness dimension sharpens everything. Maryland authorized nearly half a billion dollars in public investment to keep the Preakness in Baltimore — framed as protecting a piece of Maryland’s identity, its economy, and its racing heritage. Churchill Downs holds the intellectual property that gives that investment its name and its meaning.
That arrangement was negotiated and ratified. It is not inherently improper. But it does create a structural reality worth naming: Maryland is the single largest public underwriter of an event controlled by a Kentucky-based corporation whose executives are hosted, feted, and courted by Kentucky’s governor on the biggest day in American thoroughbred racing. Maryland’s governor, in the publicly available record, is not part of that conversation this weekend.
The Preakness is Maryland’s race — on paper. The brand belongs to Louisville. The check came from Annapolis. And this Saturday, the party is in Kentucky.
Sources: Mario Anderson / Spectrum News 1 (Kentucky), April 30, 2026 — announcement of Democratic governors attending Derby 152 as Beshear’s guests; Wes Moore for Maryland campaign, April 2026 — announcement of May 2nd reelection kickoff rallies in Baltimore City and Prince George’s County; Mediaite, February 15, 2026 — Beshear statement on boycotting White House governors dinner in solidarity with Moore and Polis; Kentucky Lantern / Hoptown Chronicle, May 2025 — reporting on Beshear’s Derby guest list opacity and First Saturday in May Inc.; Churchill Downs Inc. / 1/ST Racing — Preakness Stakes IP acquisition, 2023; Maryland General Assembly, capital budget records — Pimlico reconstruction appropriation, ~$450 million
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