By Michael Phillips | MDBayNews
The 2026 General Assembly session produced more than 860 new Maryland laws. Governor Wes Moore signed the overwhelming majority of them. But five bills he chose to kill tell a more complicated story about the governor’s priorities, his relationship with the legislature, and how he plans to present himself to voters heading into a competitive reelection campaign.
Moore announced the five vetoes on May 22, just days before his final bill signing ceremony of the term. His administration characterized each one as a technical or implementation concern rather than a substantive policy objection — a framing that deserves scrutiny on at least a few of the bills.
Here is what Moore vetoed, and what it means.
SB 426 — Divorce Records
The most consequential and politically interesting veto. Senate Bill 426, sponsored by Sen. Charles Sydnor III of Baltimore County, would have required the denial of public records requests for divorce applications, financial and settlement records, and custody orders.
Moore’s rationale acknowledged the impulse behind the bill while rejecting its scope. “Personal privacy and safety concerns should never be minimized or ignored,” he wrote in his veto letter. “While the events that led to the introduction of Senate Bill 426 were alarming, the legislation’s impact of essentially closing all divorce records is too heavy handed and could have the unintended consequence of curtailing public oversight of additional types of legal cases and judicial rulings in the future.”
Moore also cited advice from the state attorney general’s office that the legislation lacked clarity, warning that “the Judiciary may interpret the bill not to apply to judicial records” — and that a broader interpretation could raise First Amendment and government transparency concerns.
The veto is defensible on its merits. But it also hands Moore a clean accountability talking point heading into the fall: he stood for judicial transparency when his own party handed him a bill that would have sealed family court records from public inspection.
SB 459 — Local News for Maryland Communities Act
This one is harder to defend. Senate Bill 459 would have required state procurement units to direct at least 50 percent of advertising contract dollars to Maryland news organizations. Moore said he supported the goal of sustaining local journalism but raised workability objections — primarily that the mandate would restrict the state’s ability to use modern, wide-reach digital advertising channels, that many local outlets operate behind subscription paywalls limiting public reach, and that some qualifying outlets may be owned by multi-state media conglomerates rather than community-rooted organizations.
MDBayNews has previously reported that Moore vetoed a similar local news bill. The pattern is worth noting: a governor who presents himself as a champion of working Marylanders has now twice declined to use the state’s purchasing power to direct resources toward the local outlets that cover those communities. His promise to pursue “a more targeted solution” in the 2027 session is the kind of commitment that is easy to make and easy to forget.
SB 862 — Freight Trains on Passenger Rail Corridors
Moore also vetoed House Bill 862, which would have prohibited freight trains sharing the same corridor as high-speed passenger or commuter trains from operating in Maryland unless they met certain conditions. The governor cited federal preemption concerns — federal railroad law significantly limits states’ ability to regulate freight rail operations. It is a legitimate legal objection, though one that raises questions about why the bill advanced as far as it did before reaching his desk.
SB 448 — Carroll County Bond Bill (Duplicate)
Moore vetoed Senate Bill 448, which would have authorized Carroll County to issue $27 million in general obligation bonds for public facilities, because he had already signed the identical House Bill 927. Enacting both would have doubled the authorized debt. Procedural, not political.
SB 121 — Noise Abatement Monitoring Pilot Extension
Similarly procedural. Senate Bill 121 extended a noise abatement monitoring pilot program in Montgomery and Prince George’s Counties through June 2028 — but Moore had already signed House Bill 18, which accomplished the same thing. Duplicate vetoed.
The Pattern
Three of the five vetoes were substantive. One — the divorce records bill — was a defensible stand for judicial transparency. One — the freight rail bill — rested on legitimate federal preemption grounds. The local news veto is the most revealing: Moore had a low-cost opportunity to direct state advertising dollars toward the local journalism ecosystem, declined it for the second time, and offered a vague future promise in return.
Taken together, the vetoes are unlikely to define Moore’s reelection argument. But they are a useful reminder that the 860-plus bills he signed do not tell the whole story of what the 2026 session produced — or what Annapolis chose to leave on the table.
Sources for this report include veto letters published by the Office of the Governor, the Maryland Daily Record, Manis Canning & Associates legislative tracking, and MDBayNews prior session coverage.
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