Alsobrooks addresses Democrats in Chicago as she seeks to become Maryland’s first Black senator

Chicago CNN —

Kamala Harris isn’t the only Black woman trying to make history this year. Angela Alsobrooks, who delivered a keynote address in Chicago on Tuesday night, is trying to become the first Black person Maryland sends to the US Senate.

And though neither puts their history-making potential at the forefront of their public message, they’re riding a wave of Democratic enthusiasm about what’s possible in November.

“People like me, stories like mine, don’t usually make it to the United States Senate. But they should,” Alsobrooks, a mentee of Harris and fellow prosecutor, told the crowd.

“When you look at elections in this country, make no mistake about it: women, but Black women in particular, have saved this country time and time again from itself,” Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott told CNN on Tuesday before a meeting of the Maryland delegation in Chicago. “And now it’s time for us to elect them.”

Alsobrooks, the Prince George’s County executive, is vying to become only the third Black woman elected to the Senate, along with Delaware’s Lisa Blunt Rochester. (The one Black woman currently serving — California’s Laphonza Butler — was appointed and isn’t running to stay beyond this year.)

“The excitement is really, really, really big, especially with Kamala Harris at the top of the ticket,” said Karen Darkes, the executive director of the Maryland Democratic Party. “It’s not lost on Marylanders that we have a moment, that we’re in an historic moment just in our state, and we have to double down on that by electing the (state’s) first Black woman senator.”

Alsobrooks is up against Republican Larry Hogan, a popular former two-term governor, whose entrance into the race in February raised the stakes for