Editor’s note: This story, originally published at 6:30 a.m. March 21, was updated at 9:40 a.m. March 21 to include Sen. Ariana Kelly’s announcement.
District 16 Sen. Ariana Kelly (D-Bethesda) is leaving the Maryland General Assembly to become executive director of the Maryland Commission for Women, according to an announcement posted Wednesday night on the commission’s website.
Although Kelly has served in the legislature for nearly a decade and a half since her election to the House of Delegates in 2010, her departure comes little more than a year after she was appointed to fill the Senate seat previously held by Susan Lee of Bethesda, now Maryland’s secretary of state.
Kelly, 47, will assume her new position in May, a month after the 2024 session of the legislature is due to adjourn, according to the announcement by the commission – a public entity created by state statute and affiliated with the Maryland Department of Human Services.
Kelly’s “commitment to public service and her advocacy for women’s issues makes her an asset to the commission, our department and the state,” said the statement posted on the commission’s website. The statement also lauded Kelly for championing “legislation aimed at advancing women’s rights, improving healthcare access, protecting victims of domestic violence, and enhancing family economic security for all Marylanders” during her legislative tenure.
After the news of Kelly’s new position was first disclosed on the Maryland Commission for Women website Wednesday night, Kelly confirmed it in a post on X on Thursday morning.
Kelly’s departure follows the resignation of four fellow Montgomery County legislators in early 2023 to accept appointments in the administration of newly elected Gov. Wes Moore (D).
Those appointments resulted in a total of five vacancies in the county’s all-Democratic state legislative delegation, which under state law were filled by the Montgomery County Democratic Central Committee (MCDCC) until the next regularly scheduled legislative election in 2026.
A onetime executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Maryland, Kelly in 2010 emerged as the top vote getter among a primary election field of 10 candidates taking aim at a vacant House of Delegates seat in Bethesda/Chevy Chase-based District 16. She was re-elected in 2014, 2018 and 2022 prior to her appointment to Lee’s vacant Senate seat in 2023.
Her departure leaves Del. Marc Korman (D-Bethesda), first elected in 2014, as the district’s senior legislator. But Korman – who has risen steadily in the House of Delegates leadership ranks and now chairs that chamber’s influential House Environment and Transportation Committee – is considered highly unlikely to pursue the Senate seat being vacated by Kelly.
That appears to leave Del. Sara Love (D-Bethesda), first elected in 2018, as the early favorite for the slot.
The District 16 delegation also includes Del. Sarah Wolek (D-Bethesda), who was named last year to fill the House of Delegates seat vacated when Kelly was named by the MCDCC to succeed Lee in an appointment process that was often contentious.)
Kelly’s new job will involve overseeing a commission that, according to its website, “works with Maryland state government to advance solutions and to expand social, political and economic opportunities for all women.”
In describing its “legislative mandate,” the commission says its role is to “study the status of women in our state, direct attention to critical problems confronting women, recommend methods of overcoming discrimination, and recognize women’s accomplishments and contributions” as well as to “provide informed advice to the executive and legislative branches of government on the issues concerning the women of our state.”
This story will be updated.