Name: Ben Kramer
Occupation: Maryland State Senator, representing MoCo’s 19th District
Affiliations: Maryland Democratic Party. Member, Liquor Control Task Force, Montgomery County. Past member, Police Department Citizens Advisory Board, Montgomery County.
Background: A one-time state delegate who became a state senator in MD from MoCo back in late 2018, when anti-Donald Trump fervor seemed to sweep the insider political class of MoCo into various higher positions, locally. In 2016, Andrew Metcalf’s reporting revealed that “Kramer, a Wheaton Democrat, co-owns a real estate business with his sister Rona Kramer that collected $2.56 million in lease payments from the [MoCo Liquor Monopoly / DCL] from 2003 to 2015 for a 6,350 square-foot retail store in the Cloverly section of Silver Spring.”
Hates growing prosperity in MoCo? Yes. Particularly craft beer industry growth or those who simply want to bring adult beverage choices to… other adults in MoCo. A cynic *might* say… he opposes anyone or anything that might impact his lease payments from a MoCo Dept of Liquor store – right now the only “game in town” for adult consumers.
Why/how? Thanks for asking. By attacking the craft brewing industry in MD from his perch in Annapolis, and by partnering with other statehouse democrats in keeping the nascent industry stunted. A recent piece from theBaltimoreBanner.com reveals:
The most infamous example was 2017′s H.B. 1283, which, if not amended at the eleventh hour, would have halted the craft beer industry in our state. It contained a buyback provision, in which a brewer that wished to sell more of its own beer in its own taproom would have to sell the beer to a distributor at dealer cost, then buy it back at full retail cost. That buyback provision of the law was later repealed. Such illogical and punitive proposals, layered atop a series of highly restrictive laws, illustrated precisely why Maryland’s craft beer sector has now fallen behind neighboring states in size per capita, production, sales and economic impact.
Claim to shame: Also from theBaltimoreBanner.com [Len Foxwell writing]:
Then-Del. Ben Kramer, of Montgomery County, for instance, expressed unfounded concerns about the safety of craft beer products and about the prospects of underage consumption — as though 18-year-olds on a budget would seek to get intoxicated by consuming double-hopped New England IPA at $8 per pint. He raised such issues while saying nothing about package stores that routinely marketed 99 packs to college students.
It should be noted the state senator made little real fuss about legalizing pot in MD in 2023.
Fun fact: Senator Kramer has long supported the MoCo 1950s-era liquor monopoly. “On Aug 10, Kramer pitched a plan to maintain the county’s unique alcohol monopoly, but turn over the day-to-day operations to a private business that he said would be able to better manage product distribution. Kramer made the proposal at a meeting of the working group appointed by [then] County Executive Ike Leggett to study alternatives to the DLC’s current structure.”
What’s next? Senator Kramer attempted, but once again failed, this session (2024) to regulate roosters on private property. Yes, roosters. SB 1055, of which he was a sole sponsor, reads:
Prohibiting, unless authorized by the Department of Agriculture, a person from keeping more than 5 roosters per acre on a single property or more than a total of 25 roosters on a single property beginning January 1, 2026, subject to certain exceptions;
