It’s less than three months away from the county executive general election in Prince George’s and an entrepreneur and community advocate is working to make sure her name gets on the ballot.
Tonya Sweat said this week, she submitted a petition along with the required 6,000 signatures needed to be on the ballot as an independent.
Current County Executive Aisha Braveboy won the Democratic primary with more than 73% of the vote.
“We don’t just have apathy in Prince George’s County, we have learned hopelessness in Prince George’s County because we’re seeing the same faces over and over again. Nothing’s changing for us,” Sweat said on why she wants to run.
Sweat said for the last couple of months, she, along with others in the county, have noticed a need for new leadership and more options on the ballot.
“Our current leadership — they’re not listening,” Sweat said. “We’ve told them we don’t want hyper-scale data centers; they’re playing games with that. We’ve fussed about the high taxes; the taxes are still increasing. We’ve complained about the infrastructure.”
The Sweat campaign said it showed up Monday morning to the county’s board of elections with more than 6,300 signatures that the campaign said it believed were needed to be on the ballot and were told they didn’t have enough signatures.
“At 11:28 a.m., the administrator sent me an email that the number is 6,531 based upon what I sent you on June 8,” Sweat said. “I don’t know where she got that number from. I cannot find it.”
News4 reached out to the Prince George’s County Board of Elections, and it denied the request for an interview. Instead, it provided News4 with the requirements needed for an unaffiliated candidate seeking county office:
According to Maryland law, an unaffiliated candidate must collect valid signatures from at least 1% of the total registered voters, including those on inactive status.
The county’s board of elections went on to say that the potential candidate must file a declaration of candidacy, must collect signatures for approved forms and that the final deadline to submit a petition to appear on the 2026 general election ballot was 5 p.m. on Aug. 3.
Sweat said her campaign was able to get the remaining signatures needed and submitted them before the 5 p.m. deadline on Monday.
She said this effort is historic because if she can move forward, she would be the first independent candidate to appear on the general election ballot as a candidate for the office of county executive in the 330-year history.
“Didn’t even think about it until it was pointed out to me,” Sweat said. “Then I had to take a deep breath because that makes the weight heavier.”
Sweat said the board of elections told her that they would need 20 days to ensure the signatures that she submitted are accurate, and she said after that, she will find out if she would be on the ballot for the November general election or if she will have three days to appeal their decision.
News4 reached out to Braveboy’s campaign for comment and is still waiting for a response.
