By Michael Phillips | MDBayNews | Election Coverage
Thursday night’s community meeting in Gaithersburg was never going to be an easy room. Residents were angry about a fatal police shooting and a round of ICE arrests, and they made that clear to the more than half a dozen elected officials who showed up to face them. One name missing from that list: Will Jawando, the Democratic nominee for Montgomery County executive.
Jawando did not attend the meeting. Brenda Diaz, a candidate for the county Board of Education who was at South Lake Elementary that night, said as much publicly, naming several officials who were present and noting Jawando was not among them. MDBayNews separately reviewed video shot at the event and did not find Jawando in any of it. His Republican opponent, Esther Wells, did attend.
What the meeting was, and why attendance mattered
“It was exactly the kind of room a candidate for county executive might want to be seen in, or might want to avoid.”
Councilmember Dawn Luedtke (D-Dist. 7) convened the event at South Lake Elementary School to connect Gaithersburg and Montgomery Village residents with county services, in the wake of the July 12 fatal shooting of Elliott Powers at a Lost Knife Road bus stop and a series of ICE arrests at Bohrer Park in July. The Baltimore Banner reported the meeting drew several dozen people and more than a dozen local elected officials, and that tempers flared as attendees shouted over presenters and demanded direct answers about the shooting.
Luedtke stayed afterward to talk with attendees and told the crowd, “I have been screamed at tonight,” adding that she was doing her best to answer everyone’s questions, according to the Banner’s account.
It was, in other words, exactly the kind of room a candidate for county executive might want to be seen in, or might want to avoid.
Wells was there. She made sure people knew it.
“Wells was there. She made sure people knew it.”
Wells posted from the meeting in real time, telling followers she was attending and noting that her opponent was not. She framed her presence as consistent with a campaign pitch built around showing up in communities she says Democratic officials have neglected, a message she has also aimed at former primary rival Andrew Friedson’s voters in the weeks since the June primary.
Whatever the political calculation behind it, Wells’ attendance at a meeting this fraught is a matter of public record, documented by her own posts and consistent with reporting on who was in the room.
“The county’s political leadership came to a school cafeteria to face an angry room. The Democratic nominee was not among them.”
The bottom line
“Nothing about missing one community meeting, on its own, tells voters much.”
Nothing about missing one community meeting, on its own, tells voters much. Candidates skip events for all kinds of reasons, and Jawando’s campaign hasn’t yet had the chance to explain this one. But in a county executive race that both campaigns are increasingly framing around who shows up for constituents and who doesn’t, a fatal police shooting and ICE arrests drawing the county’s political leadership to a school cafeteria, minus the Democratic nominee, is the kind of contrast that will get pointed to again before November.
Sources: The Baltimore Banner’s Aug. 28, 2026 report by Ginny Bixby on the South Lake Elementary community meeting. Bethesda Magazine’s Aug. 17, 2026 preview of the meeting. Esther Wells’ Aug. 27, 2026 posts to X regarding her attendance at the meeting. Brenda Diaz’s Aug. 27, 2026 posts to X naming officials in attendance and stating Jawando was not present. MDBayNews’s own review of video recorded at the event. MDBayNews’s Aug. 28, 2026 report on Wells’ campaign strategy targeting Friedson’s primary voters.
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