Anne Arundel County’s District 33, which lies roughly between the Magothy and Severn rivers, has long been a Republican stronghold. Jack Cade held the Senate seat for 20 years from the mid 1970s to the mid 1990s. And Ed Reilly, who is retiring, has held it for the last 13 years. But it has gained more registered Democrats through redistricting, making this year’s Senate race more competitive.
Now, that race is mired in a nasty defamation suit. Sid Saab, a two-term Republican Delegate from the district, has sued his Democratic opponent, Dawn Gile for $2 million in Anne Arundel Circuit Court. The suit charges Gile distributed campaign literature falsely suggesting that he was under federal indictment for Medicare violations. The suit also charged that Gile’s campaign darkened his face in a photo to make him look like, in his words, “a sinister minority.”
Saab says he didn’t want to sue, but “politics is a contact sport, and sometimes people may stretch the truth,” he said. “But they went beyond stretching the truth. They went into completely making things up and trying to fool the voters and make them think that I was under indictment.”
But Gile didn’t distribute those flyers. They came from the Maryland Democratic Senate Caucus Committee, the campaign arm of state Senate Democrats. Saab says that doesn’t matter.
“It was for her benefit. It was done with her coordination,’’ he argued. "She's the one that's running, she's the candidate. It's not them.”
Gile called the suit a “distraction and a misuse of the legal system” and insisted it wouldn’t distract her or knock her off course “from something that I've already been working very hard on for the last year and a half. And that's working hard to represent the people of District 33 and to provide them more effective representation that matches their values.”
The case now appears to be headed for mediation while the campaigns continue.
Gile was at a rally on a recent Sunday morning sending a crowd of candidates and volunteers door knocking in Severna Park.
“We all are here to save our democracy, to fight for our civil rights, things like what we as women can do with our own bodies, keeping our kids safe from gun violence when they go to school,” she told the volunteers. “Our state legislatures make the rules on which our democracy operates and how voters cast their ballots. So thank you all so much for being here for showing up for fighting for democracy with us.”
Saab used a scooter to work a leafy neighborhood in Arnold by himself one weekday evening, knocking on doors and introducing himself as “Sid Saab, your state delegate.”
He frequently invokes his immigrant experience as a reason he seeks public office. He came to the United States from Lebanon at age 19 with $700 in his pocket. He’s 51 now and a successful businessman.
“I came here looking for electricity, water and safety,” he says. “And America has given me a lot more than what I bargained for, what I asked for, and I decided to run to give back.”
Although the district has been reliably Republican, Democrats say they saw the red wall cracking in 2018 when Heather Bagnall squeezed out a narrow victory over Republican Tony McConkey in a House of Delegates race. And they point to the increase in registered Democrats due to the 2020 redistricting.
Still, Dan Nataf, the director of the Center for the Study of Local Issues at Anne Arundel Community College, says he’s not sure if there’s been enough of a change to lift Gile to victory. And he cautioned Democrats not to read too much into Bagnall’s win four years ago.
“Because 2018 was such a banner year for Democrats all over the country, who were united in their common dislike of the president at the time,” he explained. “And now that person is not there to be hated with such zeal.”
Yet Gile may have some significant help with the endorsement of Ardath Cade, the widow of Jack Cade, the Republican who held the District 33 Senate seat for 20 years, who has a building named for him at the community college and a portion of Interstate 97 between Annapolis and Baltimore dedicated to him.
Cade, herself a former Deputy Secretary of the state Department of Housing and Community Development and prominent Republican, called Gile “a moderate who will stay attuned to the concerns of our District 33.”
She said her late husband stuck to his Republican principles in a deeply Democratic state, yet remained an “influential and respected voice” in the state. Gile will “strive to work as broadly and thoughtfully on behalf of all of us, no matter our party affiliation,” she added.
Nataf called that a signal because Ardath Cade is as much a fixture in Republican circles as her husband had been.
“For her to endorse Dawn Gile is a signal for Republican leaners who might not like Sid Saab for whatever reason, that it's okay to vote for this person.”
He said it sends a “pretty strong message, maybe the strongest one she has.”
This post has been updated to more accurately reflect the status of the court case.
