even deeper blue Baltimore, there are equally passionate voters for the Republican Donald Trump. His voters cited his hard-line stance on immigration, and how they think he would be better on the economy — although there were also those who thought Harris would help those in the middle class more.

And at Cross Country, between Mount Washington and Pikesville, his support of Israel mattered.

“I was especially motivated this year,” said Allen Martin, 64, a physician who specializes in neurological rehabilitation. “This is a pivotal election.”

Martin said he voted for Trump, saying he understands others may be put off by his blunt, no-filter style, but that he attributes to the former president’s differently functioning brain — something he said he sees all the time in his field of medicine.

For him, Trump’s being a “staunch and long-standing supporter of Israel” looms large. “We have a saying, ‘hakarat hatov,’ for recognizing the good. We say ‘hakarat ha Trump,’” Martin said.

The apparent tightness of the race had many feeling unsettled, grateful to have voted but wondering how they would get through the counting of ballots and whatever happened after that.

“I’m anxious about the outcome,” said Lauren Simon, 43, a nurse who voted at Corkran Middle School in Glen Burnie. “I don’t think I can watch it tonight. I think I’ll just go to sleep and wake up and find out then.”

Like other women, she cited what is happening with abortion rights in the country after Roe v Wade was overturned as a reason she felt compelled to vote this year, and for Harris. Simon, who is Black, is concerned with the judiciary as a whole, particularly as it affects issues such as police powers, in addition to how it will impact the continuing fight over abortion.

“Those Supreme Court justices were hand-picked [to overturn Roe], and they were hand-picked by Trump,” she said. “I’m not convinced Trump is not going to pick up where he left off.”

That, too, was Lisa Bennett’s fear.

“After Roe v Wade, are we next?” asked the 32-year-old artist who identifies as part of the LGBTQ+ community.

The Harris voter remembered graduating from college in 2015, the same year the high court ruled same-sex couples have the right to marry.

“I thought once something was at the Supreme Court, it was done,” Bennett said. Now she fears gay marriage also could fall.

The political climate of recent years has taken its toll on her family, she said, with she and her mother on one side versus the rest of the family. “The divisions just got deeper and deeper,” Bennett said.

Regardless of side, voters expressed a yearning to turn the page. They just disagreed on who they wanted to see on the other side.

“I just want the country to be better than it is now,” said Fred Thompson, 72, a retiree. “That’s why I’m voting for Donald J. Trump.”

Thompson, who worked at a grocery distribution center, described himself as a former Democrat. He lives in Armistead Gardens in Northeast Baltimore, which has seen an influx of Hispanic immigrants in recent years.

“I don’t bother them. They don’t bother me,” Thompson said. But, he added, “I think everybody should be in the country legally.”

Jorge Montalvo, a 75-year-old retiree in Armistead Park said that while he is an immigrant, originally from Bolivia, immigration policy is not a priority issue for him. Rather he wants a strong and growing economy, something he thinks Harris can bring about.

Montalvo, who retired from the hotel industry, initially was impressed by Trump, thinking he projected strength and resolve. But then the Jan. 6 insurrection happened.

“He wants to be king. I didn’t think that could happen in America,” he said. “I love this country. I want this country to be the great country that it is.”

Editor’s note: Across the state, Marylanders went to the polls Tuesday, each with a different reason driving them. Here’s a sampling of their individual motivations, as told to Sun reporters.

Homework done, time to vote

Debra Elfenbein, who enjoys the “ritual” of voting on Election Day itself, arrived prepared at Baltimore Unity Hall on Tuesday.

The 63-year-old librarian’s research on Trump included not just remembering what she calls the “chaos” of his first term; she also read all 448 pages of the report on Russian interference in the 2016 election by former special counsel Robert Mueller.

Her motivation? The Madison Park resident had a two-word answer: “Saving democracy.”

Elfenbein also voted against Question H, the ballot measure to reduce the size of the Baltimore City Council, and against Question F, which would allow a private developer to take the lead in revitalizing the Inner Harbor.

“The Inner Harbor absolutely needs an update and an upgrade,” she said, “but I oppose the idea of a developer doing it and in some way managing the public space.”

— Baltimore Sun staff

Dressed and ready for what comes next

Looking to the next stages of his life, 22-year-old Garrett Snelling, a Republican, said his vote this Election Day was based on which candidate can lower the cost of living.

“I am 22 so I am going into a big stage in my life where I’ll be on my own, paying for my own things for the first time, so it is very important to get out here and vote for who you think is going to be the best for us and our future,” Snelling said.

He declined to say whom he voted for.

Snelling is a senior at Towson University and voted at Fallston High School, Harford County’s largest polling precinct. A reported 1,531 voters cast ballots there by 3 p.m.

Snelling was wearing a suit for the occasion, but after all, he was not just at his former high school to vote, but to attend an interview for an internship there.

— Matt Hubbard

Deciding late, for a third option

Karen Ugarte, 66, of Westminster, said she was not ready in time to cast her ballot by mail, and voting at Friendship Valley Elementary would give her more time to decide.

A registered Republican and retired medical assistant, Ugarte said that neither of the two major presidential candidates received her vote.

“I don’t like Donald Trump because of his character qualities, so I felt like I couldn’t vote for him,” she said, “but I can’t vote for Kamala Harris because I’m pro-life, so that abortion issue was big for me too.”

Ultimately, she wrote in a different Republican of her liking.

— Brennan Stewart

Not garbage

Jesús Rivera, a hospital chaplain, said he was motivated to vote for Kamala Harris because she’s “class” and he believes “men need to start listening to women more.”

The 71-year-old added that he is Puerto Rican and had “feelings” about a comedian at a Trump rally calling his homeland a “floating island of garbage.”

The immigrant community is important, said Rivera, who pointed to his own family. He is one of 14 siblings, all of whom went to college, because it was prioritized by his parents who moved to America, after themselves reaching only the third grade.

He also noted that his ballot included votes for three minority women candidates.

— Baltimore Sun staff

Yes to Trump, no to Hogan

Darrell Healy, who just moved to Dundalk from Middle River, said he’s hoping to cast his vote for Trump given the former president’s economic record.

“If I can live with the man’s mouth, his politics are worth it,” Healy, an independent voter who leans Republican, said.

But Healy “cannot stand” former Gov. Larry Hogan’s “flip-flopping,” and will be writing in a choice on the U.S. Senate race.

“He just leans to whatever’s the most convenient to him,” Healy said.

— Baltimore Sun staff

A vote for Harris, and perhaps a Senate majority

Jeffrey Johnson-Bey, 50, voted Tuesday at Gunpowder Elementary School with his 21-year-old son accompanying him for the first time.

Though pleased with the job Larry Hogan did as governor, Johnson-Bey voted for Angela Alsobrooks for Senate.

The reason? To give Harris, his presidential choice, “a Democratic-led Senate to deal with instead of giving Trump a Republican-led Senate.”

— Baltimore Sun staff

Party politics, by necessity

Bates Robinson says there was a time when she didn’t care that much whether people in her life voted for Democrats or Republicans.

But when Trump entered politics, that changed. Robinson, of Madison Park in West Baltimore, said just moments after voting at Baltimore Unity Hall. The former president’s rhetoric is so harsh and unforgiving that he sowed discord throughout his term, and “if we didn’t vote, we’d be in trouble,” Robinson said.

Robinson supports Harris not because she’s Black like her, but because the Democrat “is for all the people, not some of them. If Trump came off like that, we wouldn’t have the problems we have. We see trouble in him trying to run the country again.”

— Baltimore Sun staff

‘Scary what is possible’

Anthony Seegars, 51, and his wife, Stacie, 53, of Columbia, own a property management business and are concerned about the economy and immigration. That led to votes for Trump.

Anthony said he hopes voting will make a difference nationally.

“It’s important that everyone votes,” he said. “This is a very crucial election, and it’s kind of scary what is possible from what’s been going on and we wanted to do our little part.”

— Allana Haynes

Trump 2020

Retired postal worker Lynne Ruckert, 67, moved from Virginia to Mount Airy last year and voted in her first Maryland election at Parr’s Ridge Elementary School shortly before 3:30 p.m. Rather than casting a mail-in ballot, Ruckert said she wanted to vote physically at the elementary school to see the people, see the voter turnout and to “just do it with [her] own hands.”

Wearing her “Trump 2020” baseball cap as she exited the polls, Ruckert stopped to take a selfie with a sign that said “vote here,” capturing the occasion on her cellphone.

“This hat is from 2020, and I really liked what [Trump] did with this country when he was president,” Ruckert said. “[Harris’] record as vice president for four years has been a failure to this country. Trump has his flaws, but don’t we all, and I really think this country is at a very dangerous time. We need to make some big changes.”

— Brennan Stewart

A compassionate mother figure

Tory Boone, 50, says he believes Republicans favor business interests over the needs of the poor. As a man who has been incarcerated, he wants others to deal with him and others in his situation as people “who have paid our debt to society” and give them a fair opportunity to “not keep on being stagnated, to prosper.”

Boone, who lives in transitional housing, said he views Trump as being more connected to moneymaking interests than as a politician of empathy. That, he said, had him leaning in the direction of Harris, a woman he said he views as a compassionate mother figure.

“When you grow up in a single-family home, you know that it’s moms who rule the roost. But I’m still not sure Kamala Harris would be able to make all the changes we really need, you know what I mean?” he said. “It’s still a man’s world out there. It’s an interesting time.”

— Baltimore Sun staff