Will Jawando wins race for Montgomery County executive decisively

Will Jawando decisively won the race for Montgomery County executive, beating his Republican opponent, Esther Wells, by 57 percentage points.

At an election night watch party in Bethesda, Jawando walked out with his wife, Michele Jawando, to “Alright” by Kendrick Lamar, which he’s used throughout his campaign.

“I told you all when we started this campaign in May 2025 that we were going to be all right,” Jawando said to cheers. “This county is going to be all right.”

A crowd of supporters packed a ballroom in the Marriott hotel and expanded into an overflow room down the hall.

“Who does Montgomery County belong to? The answer is all of us,” Jawando said. “It belongs to each and every one of us, citizen or noncitizen, Black and white, Latino and Asian, no matter what we are … this is our county. This is our moment.”

The 43-year-old Jawando, an at-large council member who suffered a heart attack in early September, had bested council colleagues Andrew Friedson and Evan Glass in the competitive June primary, running on a campaign to boost education funding and affordable housing.

Tuesday’s turnout sealed Jawando’s win.

Jawando pulled in 78% of the vote, according to election returns from the Maryland State Board of Elections when the race was called early Wednesday morning.

Jawando’s primary win was bolstered by an endorsement from Gov. Wes Moore. He was also endorsed by County Executive Marc Elrich, who planned to run for a third term until voters chose to limit the county executive to two terms with a county charter amendment in 2024.

But Elrich is expected to return to county government as an at-large council member after Tuesday’s vote. The Takoma Park resident won one of four at-large seats. He will be joined by Scott Goldberg, a former county Democratic Party chair, and Karla Silvestre, a school board member, who will also take at-large council seats. Incumbent Laurie-Anne Sayles was elected to a second term as an at-large council member.

The four Democrats handily beat out Republican Sherwin Wells, a real estate agent and Esther Wells’ brother.

Democrat and school board member Julie Yang decisively beat former county Republican Party Chair Reardon Sullivan for the District 1 council seat. Sullivan raised more money than any other GOP candidate in the county, $90,949, in an attempt to beat out Yang in the heavily blue county. However, Yang still raised more than Sullivan, with $469,501.

Yang will replace Friedson, who was required to vacate his council seat in order to run for county executive. District 1 includes Bethesda, Potomac, Chevy Chase and other parts of western Montgomery County.

In District 3, Gaithersburg Mayor and Democratic nominee Jud Ashman beat Republican Ricky Mui. Ashman will replace Sidney Katz, who is term-limited this year. The district includes Gaithersburg and Rockville.

Democratic council incumbents Marilyn Balcombe (Dist. 2), Kate Stewart (Dist. 4), Kristin Mink (Dist. 5), Natali Fani-González (Dist. 6) and Dawn Luedtke (Dist. 7) also handily won reelection to their seats. All five will serve a second four-year term.

The new County Council will feature the most women in the legislative body in the county’s history. The new council, which will be inaugurated in December, will have eight women.

In uncontested races, State’s Attorney John McCarthy, who ran unopposed, was elected to his sixth four-year term. Democrat Will Milam, who ran without a Republican challenger, will replace Maxwell Uy as the county’s sheriff.

This is a developing story and will be updated.