Rick Hutzell
Annapolis columnist
Rick Hutzell is the Annapolis columnist for The Baltimore Banner. He writes about what’s happening today, how we got here and where we’re going next. The former editor of the Capital Gazette, he led the newspaper to a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the 2018 mass shooting in its newsroom. Rick has worked as a journalist in Annapolis since 1987, and he knows the city and its people about as well as anyone can. A native Marylander, Rick lives in Annapolis with his wife, Chara. They have two grown children and enjoy life in a city on the Chesapeake Bay.
The latest from Rick
Hutzell: Election Day follows Halloween by 3 days. In 2026, it is much scarier.
COLUMN | I am afraid of war. I fear election interference. Halloween arrives on Saturday, followed by Election Day on Tuesday. Here are four things that scare the living daylights out of me right now.
Hutzell: Military stunts at football games are great fun. Until someone dies.
COLUMN | Congress must review the safety of flyovers, skydiving and rappelling at football games to ensure the military is focused on the right mission.
Hutzell: Frogs, salamanders and Gloria Steinem — how No Kings rallies protect democracy
COLUMN | After 18 months of No Kings rallies, how do protesters keep their messages from vanishing into the anonymous roadside of political discourse? Wit, whimsy and a bit of showmanship as we hurtle into midterm election early voting.
Hutzell: Andy Harris has a temper. This will make him angry again.
COLUMN | As the whole world saw last week, U.S. Rep. Andy Harris has a temper. During his years as a legislator in Annapolis and on Capitol Hill, his seemingly disproportionate blowups are legendary.
Hutzell: Maryland’s love of public executions once was as bloodthirsty as Pete Hegseth’s
COLUMN | President Donald Trump has spared us the ignominy of renewing the barbarity of public executions. But Maryland was once as bloodthirsty for these horrid spectacles as Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth was.
Hutzell: Online gaming PAC accentuates the negative in Maryland state Senate race
COLUMN | Why has a political action committee for online gaming interests spent $289,000 to influence the election bid of a junior Democratic senator from Annapolis? The jackpot is state Senate President Bill Ferguson.
Hutzell: Andy Harris the bully shows up at the end of his Maryland campaign
COLUMN | Andy Harris’ behavior toward a college journalist in a small community center in Cambridge might be the most telling Maryland political moment of the year.
Hutzell: Maryland political slogans shape elections — then often vanish
COLUMN | Political slogans are written to carry just enough meaning to inspire people. You can read them and fill in the blanks with your own meaning, space left by clever writers. Here are a few to remember, and soon forget.
Hutzell: Anduril’s coming to Maryland! The great and terrible news.
COLUMN | Yay! The biggest injection of jobs into the Maryland economy in 10 years! An estimated $2 billion pumped into the Baltimore region’s economy, including $312 million in wages. Win, win, win! Uh, so why am I the only one feeling conflicted?
Hutzell: Judges may be the most important vote on the ballot. Ron Jarashow would like a word.
COLUMN | Anne Arundel County is the only Maryland jurisdiction with a contested election for Circuit Court judge this fall. How will you choose? Ron Jarashow, a judge for eight months before losing in an election, can help.
Hutzell: Inside Pete Hegseth’s strategy to control military thinking
COLUMN | If you think self-styled War Secretary Pete Hegseth is right, that civilians have diluted the focus on lethality at American military academies, then you really need to know about these 10 teachers in Annapolis.
Hutzell: Dan Schwartz has a real chance to beat Andy Harris in Maryland’s 1st District
COLUMN | I’ve been following Dan Schwartz since Independence Day, listening as he talks to supporters at sweat-soaked rallies, at youth door-knocking campaigns and from the back of his pickup truck. Through all that travel, I’ve been asking the essential question: Can Dan Schwartz win?
Hutzell: 106 years later, Annapolis is still trying to fix its parking problems
COLUMN | A century of arguments, amendments and angst over parking has gotten Annapolis where it is today, still unhappy with the irrefutable fact that a 17th-century city center struggles to cope with automobiles in the 21st.
Hutzell: Maryland knows bottle bills work. Why are we still pretending they’re radical?
COLUMN | Arguments against a bottle deposit program are pretty much what you’d expect. Developments in Maryland and D.C. may be changing the outcome.
Hutzell: Here’s what Luminis Health won’t say about its cyberattack
COLUMN | Luminis Health has been focused on restoring its healthcare systems in the weeks following a cyberattack. It may never explain what happened, but there are some clues.
Hutzell: Finding balance on Chesapeake menhaden, the most important fish in the bay
COLUMN | The autumnal equinox is at 8:05 p.m. The cree-cree, cree-ek of the osprey went silent in the skies above my house near Annapolis a month ago. I’m not the only one who noticed that the Chesapeake Bay is out of balance.
Hutzell: Rare painting offers a window into Revolutionary War Annapolis
COLUMN | If historians are correct, a lost work by James Peale has been found — a rare window into the unfolding revolution from one of the most famous names in early American art.
Hutzell: Andy Harris helped make Americans sick this summer
COLUMN | As chair of a key appropriations subcommittee, U.S. Rep. Andy Harris helped delay a rule that would have traced the source of cyclospora in food that made people sick in 49 states over the summer.
Hutzell: ICE deported a Naval Academy midshipman’s mother. We need families like theirs.
COLUMN | This nation will need Midshipman David Garcia and others like him — immigrants and their families torn apart by President Donald Trump’s cruel immigration purge — once the madness of this moment ends.
Hutzell: 25 years after 9/11, is America safe from terrorism?
COLUMN | In the chaos of America on the 25th anniversary of those attacks, I can’t help but ask if 9/11 could happen again. Are we safe?
