Rep. Elijah Cummings (D)

The congressman from the 7th District is Elijah Cummings, who won a 1996 special election after Kweisi Mfume resigned to become president of the NAACP. Cummings is the son of sharecroppers from South Carolina who moved north for a better life for their seven children. He grew up in Baltimore, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Howard University, and then got a law degree from the University of Maryland. He practiced law for a time in Baltimore, and then in 1982, at age 31, he ran successfully for the Maryland House of Delegates, where he served 16 years and rose through the ranks to become speaker pro tem. When he ran for the U.S. House, his main competition was the Rev. Frank Reid III, stepbrother of Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke, who raised $255,000. Cummings had support from local businesses and community-development organizations, and raised $450,000. He won with 37% of the vote to 24% for Reid. He has not been seriously challenged in a primary or general election since then.

Cummings lives in troubled west Baltimore, where he is a crusader against drug abuse and for stricter gun control. His voting record has been mostly liberal, but he has a pragmatic streak that allows him to work with Republicans in legislative coalitions. When the GOP controlled the House, he worked with Indiana conservative Republican Mark Souder to reauthorize the White House drug control office and to establish federal policy to combat rapidly multiplying methamphetamine labs. Once Democrats won the majority, he became chairman of the Coast Guard and Maritime Transportation Subcommittee at Transportation and Infrastructure, a useful niche for his port-dependent district and an opportunity for him to play a role in the debate on homeland security.

On the Oversight and Government Reform Committee, he worked closely with Democratic Chairman Henry Waxman of California on the investigation of performance-enhancing steroids in baseball, and emphasized the detrimental effect steroid use was having on young people who look up to successful athletes. “You’re one of my heroes, but it’s hard to believe you, sir,” Cummings told former star pitcher Roger Clemens at a 2008 hearing. When Waxman in November 2008 was chosen to chair the Energy and Commerce Committee, some Democrats urged Cummings to challenge the more senior Rep. Edolphus Towns, D-N.Y., to replace Waxman as chairman of Oversight. But Cummings did not run, partly to avoid conflict within the seniority-sensitive Congressional Black Caucus, an influential group that Cummings once chaired. When Cummings led the CBC in 2003 and 2004, he spoke out on issues ranging from the presidential succession crisis in Haiti to the appointment of federal judges.

Cummings usually wins re-election by landslide margins, and in 2006 he was unopposed. He backed Mfume in the Democratic primary for the open Senate seat that year, and then played a constructive role in coalescing Democrats behind the eventual nominee, former Rep. Ben Cardin. In 2007, he bucked most of the Maryland Democratic establishment by announcing his early support of Barack Obama in the Democratic primary. In October 2008, he cited telephone calls from Obama in explaining why he reversed his initial opposition to the $700 billion bailout of the financial industry to a vote in favor of the bill. Cummings, who had been highly critical of the role of Wall Street managers in the financial collapse, expressed outrage when the media reported that officials of insurance giant AIG celebrated the bailout with a lavish golf and spa vacation at a California beach resort. He said, “They were getting their manicures, their facials, their pedicures and their massages while American people were footing the bill!”