Midday

Brandon was elected President of the City Council by his fellow council members last year when then Council President Jack Young became Mayor after Catherine Pugh’s fall from grace. He was first elected to the Council in 2011 to represent the 2nd District. Before that, he worked in the office of then Council President Stephanie Rawlings Blake as her representative in Northeast Baltimore. In 2018,...

Today, another in our series of Conversation with the Candidates. Tom's guest is Maryland Delegate Nick Mosby, the Democratic nominee for Baltimore City Council President. Delegate Mosby has represented Baltimore’s 40th District in the Maryland House of Delegates since 2017. Previously, he served for five years as a member of the Baltimore City Council. In June, Delegate Mosby beat a crowded field...

Tom's first guest today is Baltimore Museum of Art Director Christopher Bedford. He joins us to discuss the BMA's plan to sell three of the paintings in its collection to raise money for several initiatives. The paintings, Andy Warhol's The Last Supper, Clyfford Still's 1957-G and Brice Marden's 3, might collectively command as much as $65 million dollars when they go to auction. (You can view dig...

Today on Midday, we turn our attention to development projects here in Baltimore. We begin with Lexington Market. It opened in 1782. It’s the oldest continually-running market in America. It has survived the Civil War, the Great Depression, and a six-alarm fire in 1949 that devastated its main buildings. Its storied history notwithstanding, Lexington Market is badly in need of a makeover. That mak...

It’s been 17 days since Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg succumbed to cancer at the age of 87. Ginsburg was a heroic figure for millions of Americans: as the Notorious RBG, she was an icon of liberal grace, resilience and reason. A week after Ginsburg’s death, President Trump announced his pick for her replacement – conservative Judge Amy Coney Barrett, whom Trump named to the 7th Circuit...

Pastor Shannon Wright is a non-profit executive and host of the radio program and podcast called "Wright Way with Shannon & Mike in the Morning." Pastor Wright was born in New York. She's a second-generation American of West Indian descent. She is a former Vice President of the Yonkers NAACP; she also served on the New Jersey NAACP state board of directors. In 2016 she was the Republican nominee i...

Today on Midday, it’s another in our series of Conversations with the Candidates. Tom's guest is Democratic Congressman John Sarbanes, who is seeking election to an eighth term representing Maryland's 3rd Congressional district, which includes parts of Baltimore City, as well as portions of Baltimore, Howard, Anne Arundel and Montgomery Counties. Congressman Sarbanes currently serves on the House...

Reaction to the chaotic Presidential debate on Tuesday night has fallen along party lines to some extent, but as NPR’s Mara Liasson noted when she was with me on Midday yesterday, some leading Republicans have criticized the President for not condemning white supremacy and for his impolite and crass behavior. Chris Wallace, the debate moderator, came under criticism for his inability to enforce th...

NPR National Political Correspondent Mara Liasson joins Tom to analyze last night's confrontation and what we might expect when the two candidates meet again. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @MiddayWYPR, or call us at 410-662-8780.

My guest is the Republican candidate for Baltimore City Council President, Jovani Patterson. He is a cybersecurity engineer and first-time candidate for elected office. Mr. Patterson was born in the Park Heights neighborhood of Baltimore and raised in South Carolina. He later returned to Maryland and attended Capitol College in Laurel. Jovani Patterson has worked in IT and Cybersecurity for more t...

Tom’s guest is Wyatt Oroke, an English teacher at City Springs Elementary and Middle School in East Baltimore, and City School's 2020 Teacher of the Year. In addition to teaching English at City Springs, Mr. Oroke coaches boys basketball and girls volleyball, and is active as a faculty leader. Oroke is the recipient of several state and national awards for his teaching including awards from Johns...

Tom's guest is journalist John Judis, an editor-at-large at Talking Points Memo and the author of many books. He’s just out with the third in a trilogy of books he's written for Columbia University's Columbia Global Reports that examines three potent political movements that have shaped, and continue to shape, the world we live in: populism, nationalism and socialism. Judis' first book in the tril...

Today, it’s another installment in our series of Conversations with the Candidates. Tom's guest is Congressman Kweisi Mfume, who represents Maryland’s 7th District . Mfume won a special election in April to fill the vacancy left by the death of his long-time friend, Congressman Elijah Cummings. He bested a large field of Democrats in a June’s primary and now, as he did last spring, Congressman Mfu...

Tom's guests now are two activists in the LGBTQ+ community who have organized a unique event to fund organizations that are helping their community to cope with COVID 19. Jon Adler Kaplan is the development chair of the LGBTQ+ Fund at the Baltimore Community Foundation. Franklin McNeil is the co-chair of the Fund. Given that masks are a required fashion staple, they’ve organized an event, in partn...

Midday theater critic J. Wynn Rousuck joins Tom today with a look at new works by two established theater companies who've taken novel approaches to their pandemic-proscribed craft. In Single Carrot Theatre's "Keep Off the Grass: A Guide to...something" the itinerant company has found a way to do a real-live theater production without violating COVID-19 public health restrictions. Single Carrot de...

As Coronavirus metrics continue to improve in Maryland and more parents are heading back to workplaces, many are struggling to find child care. Tom talks with Anita Hilson, Executive Director of nonprofit child care provider Open Door, about the challenges area parents are facing in accessing safe and affordable childcare amid the continuing pandemic. Email us at midday@wypr.org, tweet us: @Midday...

It’s the Midday Newswrap. The late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg continues to make history. She is lying in state at the Capitol at this hour, the first woman to be so honored. President Trump is expected to announce his nominee for Justice Ginsburg’s replacement tomorrow. Last night, in Baltimore, and in cities around the country, protests continued expressing outrage at the in the sh...

We begin today with a news update from Louisville, Kentucky. Yesterday afternoon, Daniel Cameron, the Attorney General of Kentucky, and a judge, announced that a grand jury had decided NOT to indict two of the police officers who killed 26 year-old Breonna Taylor last March. News of the grand jury decision sparked loud protests in Louisville, and many other cities across the nation. Two Louisville...

It’s been six months since restaurants in Maryland were forced to shut down because of the Coronavirus. The cessation of in-person dining lasted through most of the spring. Some restrictions were eased at the end of May. As of last week, restaurants are allowed to have 75% capacity in their dining rooms. But despite their best efforts, much damage has been done. Thousands of restaurants have perma...

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who passed away from cancer last Friday, is lying in repose at the Supreme Court at this hour. On Friday, Justice Ginsburg will lie in state at the Capitol. She will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery next Tuesday, the day after Yom Kippur. And on Saturday, President Trump will announce his nomination for her replacement on the court. It does appear now that Sena...

Tom’s guest is Dr. Maya Rockeymoore Cummings. She’s a political consultant and widow of the late Rep. Elijah Cummings, who served that District for two and a half decades, and who called Maya his soul mate, in his words, “for 11 years of marriage and an eternity of connection.” In the final year of his life, before he passed away last October, Elijah Cummings worked on a memoir with the writer Jam...

The battle lines are being drawn around the timing of a Senate vote to confirm a nominee for the Supreme Court to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who passed away from cancer last Friday. The iconic jurist will lie in repose at the Supreme Court tomorrow and Thursday. On Friday, Justice Ginsburg will lie in state at the Capitol. She will be buried at Arlington National Cemetery next Tuesday, t...

Today on Midday on Politics, we assess the state of Senate races around the country, in light of the death on Friday of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. How will her passing and the fight over her successor affect the composition of the United States Senate, and the 2020 presidential election? Twenty-one Republican incumbent senators are on the ballot. There are three open seats currentl...

Whose Baltimore do we see on TV and in film? In her new book, historian Dr. Mary Rizzo examines how our city’s long-standing racial and economic divide has influenced the art that comes from here, and how public policy shapes the way artists choose to depict Baltimore in their work. It’s called Come and Be Shocked: Baltimore Beyond John Waters And The Wire. On next Tuesday, Mary Rizzo will be part...

It’s the Midday Newswrap, our review of some of the week's top news developments. On Tuesday night, President Trump left the safe cocoon of Fox News and submitted to a nationally broadcast Town Hall meeting on ABC television. At Constitution Hall in Philadelphia, undecided voters and host George Stephanopoulos challenged the President, who often contradicted his own previous statements on a number...