Justin Ready

Justin D. Ready (born April 15, 1982) is an American politician who has served as a member of the Maryland Senate since 2015, representing District 5 in Carroll County. He previously represented the district in the Maryland House of Delegates from 2011 to 2015.

Early life and education
Ready was born in Mobile, Alabama, but moved to Westminster, Maryland, at the age of 11 after living in Mississippi. He graduated from Carroll Community College in 2002, and afterwards attended Salisbury University, where he earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science in 2004.

Political career
Ready became interested in politics at a young age. After graduating from Salisbury, working as a field director on the 2004 U.S. Senate campaign of E. J. Pipkin. He later worked as a legislative aide to state delegate J. B. Jennings from 2004 to 2006, afterwards working as the chief of staff for state senator Janet Greenip.

In April 2008, the Maryland Republican Party named Ready as its executive director, replacing John Flynn. He served in this position until July 2009, when he was fired by party chairman James Pelura for "personnel reasons". Ready's firing eventually led to the removal of Pelura as chairman of the Maryland Republican Party. Ready later served as an interim executive director from July to December 2011.

Also in 2008, Ready unsuccessfully ran for delegate to the Republican National Convention, pledged to Mike Huckabee.

Maryland House of Delegates
On January 5, 2010, Ready announced that he would run for the Maryland House of Delegates in District 5A, challenging incumbent state delegates Nancy R. Stocksdale and Tanya Thornton Shewell. He won the Republican primary, placing first with 39.3 percent of the vote, and later defeated Democrats Francis X. Walsh and Sharon L. Baker in the general election alongside Stocksdale. Ready was sworn in on January 12, 2011, and served as a member of the Health and Government Operations Committee. He ran for re-election to a second term in 2014. Ready was a member of Larry Hogan's Change Maryland organization, and later served Hogan's transition team following his upset victory in the 2014 Maryland gubernatorial election.

In 2011, Ready served as a co-chair for Rick Perry's 2012 presidential campaign in Maryland. He later ran for delegate to the Republican National Convention pledged to Perry, receiving 1.2 percent of the vote.

Maryland Senate
In January 2015, following the resignation of state senator Joseph M. Getty to serve as the chief legislative officer to Governor Larry Hogan, Ready applied to fill the vacancy left by Getty in the Maryland Senate. The Carroll County Republican Central Committee nominated Ready alongside Dave Wallace and County Commissioner Robin Bartlett Frazier to fill the seat. Hogan appointed Ready to the seat on February 2, and he was sworn in on the same day. Ready was elected to a full four-year term in 2018.

Ready served as a member of the Judicial Proceedings Committee from 2015 to 2021, afterwards serving on the Finance Committee. In October 2021, Ready was elected to serve as the Senate minority whip.

During the 2016 Republican Party presidential primaries, Ready participated in organizing activities for Ted Cruz. He celebrated Donald Trump's win in the 2016 United States presidential election, calling it a "pretty stunning repudiation of Washington, D.C., and the establishment, the media establishment, and sort of the coasts".

Ready endorsed Maryland Secretary of Commerce Kelly M. Schulz in the 2022 Maryland gubernatorial election. After Schulz was defeated by far-right state delegate Dan Cox in the Republican primary, Ready endorsed Cox, claiming that he would act as a counter on progressive legislation passed by the legislature.

Political positions
During his tenure in the Maryland House of Delegates, Ready was a member of the legislature's Tea Party caucus. In January 2020, the American Conservative Union gave Ready a score of 76 percent on its annual legislative scorecard, the highest score among members of the Maryland Senate.

Crime
In the Maryland Senate, Ready repeatedly introduced and supported bills to increase penalties on violent crimes, including those involving guns. He has called crime in Baltimore "out of control and destabilizing our entire region", and has expressed skepticism on claims that gun control would decrease violent crime.

During the 2015 legislative session, Ready introduced a bill to increase penalties for human trafficking. The bill was withdrawn after activists expressed concerns that the bill's definition of "trafficker" was too broad.

In 2019, Ready introduced "Laura and Reid's Law", a bill to increase penalties for murdering a pregnant woman. The bill was named after Laura Wallen, a pregnant woman who was allegedly murdered by her boyfriend in September 2017. The bill passed and was signed into law by Governor Larry Hogan. He also introduced a bill that would prohibit courts from authorizing pretrial release for an individual accused of assaulting a police officer.

During the 2023 legislative session, Ready expressed concerns with and voted against Governor Wes Moore's appointment of Vincent Schiraldi as Maryland Secretary of Juvenile Services, pointing to the Schiraldi's controversial approach to reducing juvenile crime amid the state's "crisis in juvenile crime".

Education
In May 2015, Ready defended Governor Larry Hogan's decision to withhold $68 million in funding for Maryland's costliest public school systems, saying that the state needed to restrain its growth spending to settle its fiscal issues.

During the 2019 legislative session, Ready defended Governor Larry Hogan's executive order requiring public schools to start after Labor Day, claiming that the order resulted in "incredibly good" economic effects.

In October 2019, Ready expressed skepticism with the Kirwan Commission's recommendations, also known as the Blueprint for Maryland's Future, comparing them to the recommendations made by the Thornton Commission and arguing that it would be better to address achievement gap deficits in education locally rather than raising education funding statewide. He later voted against the Blueprint bill, arguing that it would have a significant negative impacts on the state's economy.

In February 2022, Ready signed onto a letter to the Maryland State Board of Education imploring the agency to rescind its COVID-19 mask mandate in schools, falsely claiming that masks were ineffective at limiting the spread of COVID-19.

During the 2023 legislative session, Ready introduced a bill to establish the "fundamental right to parents' rights" in education.

Electoral reform
In 2016, Ready opposed a bill to automatically register people to vote when getting their driver's license at the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration.

In March 2019, Ready said he supported Governor Larry Hogan's proposed redraw of Maryland's congressional maps—which saw Maryland's 6th congressional district redrawn to include Frederick and Carroll counties, thereby making it more favorable to Republicans—following the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit's decision in Benisek v. Lamone. In June 2021, Ready participated in hearings for Hogan's Maryland Citizens Redistricting Commission, during which he advocated for districts that broke up communities as little as possible. He criticized the redrawn congressional districts passed by the legislature during the 2021 special legislative session, calling it "incredibly gerrymandered".

During the 2021 legislative session, Ready introduced a bill to require voters to show a government-issued voter ID before casting a ballot, citing what he called "major deficiencies" in the 2020 United States presidential election. The bill was reintroduced in 2022.

Gun policy
During the 2018 legislative session, Ready said he supported a bill to repeal several sections of the Firearms Safety Act, including a ban on assault rifles.

In 2019, Ready said he opposed a bill to abolish the state's Handgun Permit Review Board, which handled conceal carry applications. In June 2022, he celebrated the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, which overturned Maryland's concealed carry laws. In 2023, Ready said he opposed the Gun Safety Act, a gun control bill that increased requirements to obtain a handgun permit and limited where guns could be publicly carried following the Bruen decision, saying that he anticipated the bill's "fiery end by the court" if passed.

Health care
Ready supports efforts to repeal Obamacare.

During the 2017 legislative session, Ready said he opposed a bill requiring companies to provide employees with five days of paid sick leave per year, which he claimed would exacerbate income inequality.

In 2019, Ready criticized the End-of-Life Option Act, which would have provided palliative care to terminally ill adults.

Immigration
Ready supported Question 4 in 2012, which sought to repeal Maryland's Dream Act, a bill that extended in-state tuition for undocumented immigrants, saying that the bill made Maryland appear as a sanctuary state.

In 2014, Ready condemned a proposal to house immigrant children at a former U.S. Army Reserve Center in Westminster, Maryland, and blamed the increase in immigrant children on President Barack Obama's immigration policies.

In 2017, Ready supported the Trust Act, a bill that would prohibit police from asking about a detainee's immigration or citizenship status. During the 2020 legislative session, he introduced legislation that would require state correctional facilities to cooperate with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), accusing detention centers in Prince George's and Montgomery counties of defying ICE requests. In 2021, Ready opposed the Dignity Not Detention Act, a bill that would end all contracts between state correctional facilities and ICE, arguing that it would make communities less safe.

In 2021, Ready said he opposed a bill to extend the state's earned income tax credit to non-citizens. In 2023, during debate on a bill to make the tax credit permanent, Ready introduced an amendment to phase out the credit for non-citizens, which was rejected in a 14-33 vote.

Policing
Ready describes himself as being pro-police, but supports citizen oversight over the police and military. He has criticized police reform bills passed by the Maryland General Assembly during the 2021 legislative session, including a bill regulating police use of force policies, which he called the "most dangerous provision in the police bill package".

During the 2023 legislative session, Ready introduced a bill that would allow police departments to negotiate contracts to purchase police body cameras, citing the state's 2025 deadline to have on-duty officers wearing body cameras. He also criticized a bill to give the attorney general of Maryland sole prosecutorial power over police-involved incidents, imploring legislators to instead pass bills to deal with violent crime.

Social issues
During the 2012 legislative session, Ready voted against the Civil Marriage Protection Act, which legalized same-sex marriage in Maryland. He later supported a ballot referendum aimed at repealing the law, saying that he believed that the "institution of marriage" was between a man and a woman. In 2022, he defended a Carroll County Board of Education policy banning pride flags in schools. During the 2024 legislative session, Ready opposed a bill to provide legal protections to health care providers that provide gender-affirming care to out-of-state patients, arguing that it would expand access to gender-affirming care to minors.

In December 2018, Ready signed onto an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court case American Legion v. American Humanist Association defending the cross-shaped Peace Cross monument in Bladensburg, Maryland.

During the 2019 legislative session, Ready voted against a bill to raise the age to buy tobacco and nicotine products from 18 to 21, calling it "government overreach".

During the 2021 legislative session, Ready introduced legislation that would give college athletes the right to profit off their names and likenesses. The bill passed and became law.

In March 2022, Ready said he opposed a bill to provide $3.5 million toward training medical professionals to provide abortions, calling it "reckless and wrong". During the 2023 legislative session, Ready sought to amend a bill creating a ballot referendum on codifying abortion access into the Constitution of Maryland to include a provision protecting the right to make reproductive decisions without being coerced by health care providers. The amendment was rejected.

Personal life
Ready is married and has two children.