What happened to Howard County Republicans? We asked them.

Even for deep-blue Howard County, where registered Democrats outnumber Republicans more than 2-to-1, this election represents a departure from previous cycles.

No GOP candidates entered the race for county executive, Howard’s top elected position, or most other local offices such as state’s attorney, register of wills and sheriff. Out of more than a dozen people who pursued County Council seats this spring, just one had an R next to their name.

Some who wanted to run this year sought advice from Allan Kittleman, Howard County’s former Republican executive who left office in 2018 and has since switched his voter registration to unaffiliated. Did they stand a chance of winning?

“No, you don’t,” Kittleman recalled telling them.

Leaders in Howard’s Republican circles have a variety of explanations for their party’s collapse. Some blamed Democrats for creating an environment hostile to conservative viewpoints. Others suspect that there’s less motivation among the base since Republicans control much of the federal government. Most acknowledged division within the party itself as a factor, with some blaming President Donald Trump.

Some county conservatives have distanced themselves from the GOP in an effort to gain more ground with voters.

Bob Cockey, who ran for county executive as a Democrat this spring, spotted a family member of Dan Cox, the Republican candidate for Maryland governor, straightening one of Cockey’s campaign signs outside a primary polling place.

“You’re a Democrat?” Cockey said she asked him.

“I am now,” he said.

Before Cockey entered the race, he called some Republicans in the county to explain that he planned to run as a moderate Democrat. Maybe he’d have a better shot at winning if he ran on the majority party’s ballot.

“When you look at the numbers, Democrats versus Republicans, it’s like sword fighting with Zorro or me playing golf against Tiger Woods,” Cockey said.

A week after the 77-year-old lost the primary to former Del. Vanessa Atterbeary, Cockey was approached by Cox’s campaign about becoming its field manager in Howard. He accepted.

Inside a Columbia meet-and-greet for Cox in September, some wore red Make America Great Again hats. Others hinted that they weren’t completely aligned with the Trump administration, describing themselves as “old school Republicans” or “Republi-crats.”

Cox, who previously embraced Trump, also distanced himself from the president. He referred to his opponent, Gov. Wes Moore, as “more MAGA” than he is.

Steve Brown, chair of Howard’s Republican Central Committee, acknowledged that there are multiple factions within the party and attributed that to the county’s proximity to Washington, D.C.

“You’ll see more diverse Republican opinions here than you will in West Virginia or [Maryland’s] Eastern Shore,” Brown said.

Division among party members doesn’t help conservatives’ chances of winning at the polls, said Berney Flowers, who serves with Brown on the committee and attended the Cox campaign event.

“We spend too much time trying to find perfection,” said Flowers, who is running against Rep. Sarah Elfreth in Maryland’s 3rd Congressional District. “While we argue, we’re losing our status with people.”

Ken Cavey, Flowers’ pastor at Bethel Baptist Church in Ellicott City, seriously considered running as a Republican for Howard County executive in 2026 but worried that he didn’t have enough name recognition or support to pull off a win. And he had bills to pay.

Howard County has a public funding mechanism, called the Citizens’ Election Fund, to help candidates with small donations pursue elected office. Cavey doesn’t object to such financing, but he said he never considered using it because of the restrictions it places on donations and endorsements from certain interest groups.

Columbia resident and longtime Republican Linda Furiate said Democrats dominate Howard County politics because they work together to support one another. There just aren’t enough Republicans in Howard to do the same, she said.

Furiate also suspects that members of her party aren’t running for office because they fear backlash from being associated with the Trump administration.

To her, Trump and the Republican Party are not one and the same. Candidates should be elected not based on their party, but on their ideas, Furiate said.

“It doesn’t matter if they’re Democrat or Republican,” she said. “Be open-minded.”

That’s similar to the messaging coming from Ryan O’Connor, the lone Republican seeking office in Howard County. O’Connor is running against Democrat Cat Carter for the council’s District 5 seat, representing the county’s western reaches. It’s the only local office currently held by a Republican, David Yungmann, who is leaving office.

After launching his campaign, O’Connor sent messages to Maryland’s party leaders but never heard back. Their focus seemed to be on far-right candidates in conservative-leaning counties and not on people like him, a self-described moderate candidate in a liberal-leaning county, he said.

In describing his own politics, O’Connor said he admires former Republican Gov. Larry Hogan. A lot of his friends are Democrats, he said, though recently some have declined to take photos with him because they don’t want to be seen with a Republican.

O’Connor is trying his best not to get caught up in the divisiveness.

“Divisiveness creates turmoil,” he said. “Bringing people together yields positive outcomes.”

Like Democrats, unaffiliated voters also outnumber Republicans in Howard County. Perhaps, O’Connor said, that’s because people don’t recognize themselves in either party.

Kittleman, who supports O’Connor, counts himself among them. When he switched from Republican to unaffiliated, he said the party hasn’t done enough to stand up to Trump.

“I’m concerned that means they’ll be in the wilderness for a long time,” Kittleman said.

As unaffiliated voters, Kittleman and other moderate independents are unable to participate in Maryland’s primary elections. He’s staunchly opposed to one-party rule and supports opening the state’s primaries as a solution to the hyperpolarization that has characterized politics of late.

The way Kittleman sees it, politicians at the local and national levels have lost their sense of civility. It’s OK to be mad, he said, just do it in a respectful way.

In 2018, when it became clear Kittleman had lost his reelection campaign to Democrat Calvin Ball, he traveled to his opponent’s victory party in Columbia, and the two hugged.

“We all had the same goal back in the day, just different ways of getting there,” Kittleman said.