Campaign funding by large donors can reflect enthusiastic support of the donor for the candidate.  But it sometimes also reflects efforts by donors to gain increased access to or influence over the candidate.  It is important that campaign funding sources be transparent so that the public can review the possible complexities of campaign support for every candidate.

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In a step toward reducing the impact of money in local politics, Anne Arundel County adopted legislation in 2023 which established the Public Campaign Financing Fund (PCFF)  for the 2026 election cycle. The program is open to candidates for County Council and County Executive.  Only one candidate for County Executive, James Kitchin, has elected to use the public financing option.  However, as seen below, Mr. Kitchin results for the 2025 period clearly suggest the feasibility of public campaign funding, even though his individual contributions were limited to $250  Mr Kitchin has a larger number of contributors and contribution dollar amounts similar to his two nearest competitors, but has no contributions greater than $250 from individuals and none from businesses or organizations.

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The State of Maryland requires every candidate to report campaign funding sources and expenditures, and the results are summarized at its Campaign Information Reporting website.  The results summarized below were gathered from this source.​