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Close races mobilize voters across Maryland

Posted at 6:33 PM, Apr 26, 2016
and last updated 2016-04-27 09:23:11-04

Whether it's to "make the country great" or to pick who will represent Maryland in the U.S. Senate, many issues were drawing people to the polls across the state Tuesday, the day of the state's primary election.

The issues mobilizing people to vote depends on whom you talk to. In areas where federal elections draw people to the polls, it's the presidential election moving people, but in Baltimore, some call it the most important election in a generation.

It's being billed as the election energized by the death of Freddie Gray, and at the city polling center right across from the rebuilt CVS at the Enoch Pratt Free Library, that thought certainly wasn't far from voters minds.

"They make a lot of promises -- 'we're going to do this, do that, help our communities' -- but we don't ever get to see none of it," said Donte Gaines, who was voting for the first time.

He was voting with his mother, Drexel Green-Brown.

"We need money for education for our schools, but that's the first thing they always want to take from," said Green-Brown.

Baltimore voters will decide on a wide list of different issues, such as who is best suited to answer dealing with thousands of blighted houses, and who will address crime head-on.

Activist Kwame Rose, who was also voting for the first time Tuesday, said it's about a candidate who stands with members of the community while working with businesses to answer that call. 

"Being the most important election in the history of Baltimore, it was about creating a future, getting us forward," said Rose, explaining his vote.

The election for mayor and nearly half the city council seats up for grabs coincide for the first time with a presidential election. There's also a hotly contested senate seat.

In Towson, first time voter Jay Bassich, a student at Towson University, said it's the nations income gap that brought him out.

"Just the income disparity in this nation, I think a lot of people really aren't paying attention to it," he said.

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