Maryland governor on Port of Baltimore updates, Rachel Morin and new CBS News poll
(CBS, KYMA/KECY) - Maryland Governor Wes Moore spoke with Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation on Sunday about the progress being made at the Port of Baltimore as it was reopened just three months after the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge.
"I'm so inspired by the work that this state have pulled off. I mean, we show that in Maryland, we do big things...And it's because we've worked together. And so the fact that the Port of Baltimore is reopened, the fact that the full federal channel, 700 feet by 50 foot depth, is now...has full access is an extraordinary accomplishment."
Gov. Wes Moore (D-MD)
During the interview, Brennan and Moore talked about Rachel Morin, a woman who was found murdered along the Ma & Pa Trail last August.
The Harford County Sheriff's office (HCSO) announced Saturday that the suspect in the Rachel Morin case has been arrested. Sheriff Jeff Gahler said Victor Martinez Hernandez from El Salvador was arrested in Tulsa late Friday night and booked into the jail early Saturday morning and charged with first-degree murder and first-degree rape.
When asked if he holds the federal government responsible for Morin's death, Moore said:
"My heart is broken for the Morin family, as is our entire state. She should still be here...We have an immigration policy that needed to have been dealt with and was not. And the consequences then fall on us as the chief executives of our state, the consequences fall on us as the leaders of our individualized jurisdictions. And we know that we have got to fix a broken immigration policy. And we know that we need Congress to act on this. And this is why this was so unbelievably frustrating that when you have a coalition that is a bipartisan coalition of both Democrats and Republicans, that get literally right up to the line to be able to get a deal done, that because you had President Trump who said this was not advantageous politically, that the deal was killed. There is an unbelievable frustration. And this is what people don't like about politics. We've got to get this deal done, and we need Congress to act on it."
Talks then came to a CBS News poll that effectively tied President Biden with former President Donald Trump, but among Black voters, Trump has gained 18% support.
When asked why that is ticking up, Moore said:
"I do think there's a larger challenge that we're seeing amongst African Americans, and particularly African American men. That's an American problem. And I think we have to understand the history of all this as well, that, you know, I'm the governor of Maryland, in a state that we have an eight to one racial wealth gap in the state of Maryland. And we know that's not because one group works eight times harder. I know that I'm the governor of a state where our largest city, Baltimore, is the home of redlining and historical redlining where home appraisals and the values and the ability to purchase a home was based on racial lines. And so these have been long standing challenges and long standing issues that, frankly, our country has not fully addressed...now what I know that we're seeing with President Biden is we're actually having plans and not platitudes to be able to address these issues. So when you're looking at the president focusing on things like homeownership, where we have one of the fastest growing rates of homeownership that we've seen, in the past 20 years, the fastest rate of Black-owned businesses, and particularly for Black men, that we've seen now in 30 years. Those are plans that are actually bearing fruit. And these are the type of things that we have to be able to acknowledge."
To watch more of Brennan's interview with Moore, click here.
