The 90 days of Annapolis lawmaking and deal-making are done, and now Maryland Gov. Wes Moore turns to convincing voters that he deserves another four years in office.

Moore will crisscross the state pitching his first term as a series of successes. He’ll need to convince voters that his achievements are as big a deal as he says they are — and that his shortcomings don’t matter as much as his critics believe.

It comes at a time when politicians are getting blamed for inflation, difficulties in foreign affairs and other issues that they may or may not control, said Mileah Kromer, pollster and director of the Institute of Politics at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Moore’s approval rating has dipped to an all-time low of 48%.

“His numbers have ticked down, but he’s not alone,” Kromer said. “There is a widespread frustration in general about government right now.”

Republicans see weaknesses that they hope to exploit.

“Whether it’s record-breaking tax increases, climbing energy costs, increased car registration fees, or policies that hurt our watermen, our farmers, and even our most vulnerable communities — combined with questions about his past and the lack of transparency — people will be looking harder before November,” Maryland Republican Party Chair Nicole Beus Harris said in a statement.

Moore faces token opposition in June’s Democratic primary and a flawed Republican field that is competing to take him on in November.

The moment isn’t without obstacles. The state faces long-term challenges. Moore’s team is also engaged in a war of words with a pair of Baltimore-based news outlets — Sinclair Broadcasting and The Baltimore Sun — over reporting on Moore’s biography and record. And his image as a swaggering, charismatic leader caught a dent when he failed to persuade state senators to join the nationwide group of states drawing new, more partisan congressional districts.

The nation’s only Black governor, Moore is also considered a potential 2028 presidential candidate. But he says he’s focused on 2026.

Moore kept his Maryland agenda modest and achievable this year: balancing the budget with no tax increases, creating an easier path to build housing at transit hubs, preventing predatory grocery store pricing and slicing a few dollars off of Marylanders’ electric bills.

As he signed the first bills into law on Tuesday, Moore contrasted efforts in Maryland to the “chaos” of President Donald Trump and Washington.

“In this moment, we did not just push back, we pushed forward,” he said. “We protected our folks at a time when we’re watching a Washington, D.C., that cannot find common ground or common cause on common-sense issues.”

The governor will kick his reelection campaign into high gear with a pair of launch events on May 2, with rallies planned in Prince George’s County and Baltimore. The campaign will focus on Moore’s efforts on improving affordability, expanding opportunity and protecting Marylanders from a federal government whose actions have put the state at risk. The campaign is a chance to test messages, themes and packaging.

Moore’s team remains bullish on his reelection chances, and the field of Republican candidates hasn’t given them much to worry about. The top contenders for the Republican nomination are party-switching retired banker Ed Hale Sr. and former delegate Dan Cox — whom Moore beat by 32 percentage points in 2022.

As his reelection campaign gets going, the governor has sparred with Sinclair Broadcasting and The Sun, who are promising a “sweeping investigation” into his past; Moore counters that they’re motivated by the owner’s Republican politics.

His response has brought attention to their work, but other Democrats have learned that scrapping with Sinclair can be good politics.

Moore does acknowledge that — if reelected — he faces more work on boosting the economy and solving a long-term projected deficit in the state budget.

“There is no doubt in my mind that there’s more to do. … I don’t know if I even fully appreciated the level of distress that Maryland’s economy was in when I walked in,” Moore said.

Moore is also concerned about the “assault from Washington” that’s led to lost jobs, tied up funding and raised prices. He says more work lies ahead.

“I will never feel like we have done enough to protect our people,” Moore said, “even though I think we’ve tried to use every lever at our disposal to do it.”

Moore said he is “so locked in” on finding more ways to counter “a federal administration that has shown just complete contempt towards our people.”

Concern about Trump and the Republican-led Congress drove Moore in his unsuccessful push for a new map to give Democrats a chance of sweeping all eight of Maryland’s U.S. House seats. Electing more Democrats to Congress would help them act as a check on Trump’s administration.

Moore got buy-in for the map from Democratic leaders in the House of Delegates, which passed a new map. But the effort stalled in the Senate, where President Bill Ferguson had insisted since October that it was a bad idea that lacked support in his chamber.

The fight put a national spotlight on Moore. Cliff Albright, co-founder and president of the national group Black Voters Matter, appreciates the governor’s fight.

“It’s important that we recognize it’s not a win or a loss for the governor,” Albright said. “This is a loss for democracy. It’s a loss for the voters of Maryland. It’s a loss for the voters across the country.”

Moore said he has no regrets about pushing for the map.

“I still do think that if the rest of the country is going to talk about this process of mid-decade redistricting, then Maryland should not sit on our hands,” he said.

Even if the map didn’t pass, “the fight that we are seeing nationally is not over,” Moore said.