See below for JUFJer Casey Wade’s written testimony on our MDGA26 Agenda at a Montgomery County Delegation Priorities Hearing.
Montgomery County Delegation Priorities Hearing
November 17, 2025
JUFJ Priorities for MDGA 2026
My name is Casey Wade, I’m a resident of District 14 and a volunteer leader with Jews United for Justice. JUFJ organizes 6,000 Jewish Marylanders and allies to advocate for social, racial, and economic justice at the state and local level.
As we near the 2026 legislative session, JUFJ is continuing to work alongside our coalition partners to meet the moment. At JUFJ, we continue to act upon our Jewish values to mobilize our communities and collaborate with those most directly impacted by harmful policies. By advancing campaigns that strengthen social, racial, and economic justice, we can build a Maryland where everyone can thrive. Our top three priorities for this session are:
- Preventing evictions to keep everyone, regardless of race or income, housed in stable, affordable and safe homes. Alongside our partners in Renters United Maryland we are calling on the legislature to fully fund the Community Schools Rental Assistance Program and pass Good Cause Evictions legislation, enabling local jurisdictions to implement protections that would prevent unjust evictions without undermining rent stabilization in Montgomery County.
- Treating kids as kids and increasing public safety by giving children who encounter our state’s criminal legal system a chance to learn and grow, rather than be discarded. We join our partners at the Maryland Youth Justice Coalition in supporting legislation to end automatically charging kids as adults in all cases. The current automatic system is inefficient, costly, and harmful. We are grateful for Senator Smith’s leadership on this legislation and call on the legislature to pass the strongest possible bill to end this harmful practice.
- Protecting Maryland immigrant communities by passing legislation to prohibit local jurisdictions from entering into 287(g) voluntary agreements with ICE. As of now, 8 sheriffs departments have entered into these agreements in Maryland. The most impactful thing Maryland can do to protect immigrant communities is to ban these agreements. We are grateful that the House conveyed their support for this legislation and that the Senate President has announced his support as well.
With so many Montgomery County legislators in key leadership positions and on key committees, your partnership on these issues will be critical. Thank you!
