Kanaiyah's Law among 197 bills signed by Gov. Wes Moore on Tuesday

Gov. Wes Moore on Tuesday signed a sweeping slate of nearly 200 bills, including a crackdown on foster care placements after a teenager's death and a first-in-the-nation effort to block grocery stores from using technology that quietly changes prices throughout the day.

This is the second time the governor has signed bills into law since the 2026 legislative session concluded earlier this month.

The measures, passed by the majority Democrat General Assembly, target both a looming nationwide consumer issue and a longstanding child welfare crisis in Maryland. Maryland Republicans backed the foster care reforms but criticized the pricing law as unlikely to meaningfully lower costs or address affordability.

Kanaiyah's Law, a bipartisan measure, requires the Department of Human Services to establish a guardianship assistance program placing minors in permanent homes and to appoint an ombudsman to oversee the welfare of children in its care. The law was named after Kanaiyah Ward, a 16-year-old who died by suicide in a Baltimore hotel where she had been housed.

"Every child in this state deserves to be supported, and every child in this state deserves to be safe," Moore said at a Tuesday bill signing ceremony flanked by House Speaker Joseline Peña-Melnyk and Senate President Bill Ferguson. "And every child in our care deserves the same standard of care that any one of us would expect and hope for for our own children today."

Ward's mother, Brooke Ward, and grandfather, Michael Ward, were present at the ceremony, and Moore gave them ceremonial pens of the session, a keepsake that the governor presents during bill-signing ceremonies to advocates, sponsors, or families affected by the legislation to acknowledge their role in passing the law.

The Protection from Predatory Pricing Act, backed throughout the session by the governor, allows the Maryland Attorney General to fine businesses up to $25,000 for fixing prices within 24 hours or using consumer data to set individualized prices. Though no such cases have been reported in Maryland, the state is the first in the nation to ban the practice to get ahead of a potential problem, Moore has previously said.

Republican leadership told The Sun that the governor should have explored other methods of providing economic relief because banning price-fixing doesn't tackle rising grocery costs head-on.

"If it [were] happening, it would not be positive, but it's hardly striking a blow for affordability for Marylanders. It's pretty weak sauce," Senate Minority Whip Justin Ready wrote in a text to The Baltimore Sun. "The Moore ‘tax and regulate and spend and tax more' agenda is what's making our state unaffordable and even adding to [the] cost of things like groceries."

Of the 197 bills, Moore also signed:

•The Maryland Voting Rights Act, which bans all counties and local municipalities from practicing vote dilution in elections. The measure was introduced as an emergency bill, meaning that it will be enacted into law immediately.

•The Maryland Values Act of 2026, which prohibits public school personnel from sharing a student's record with the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement, as it seeks to detain undocumented immigrants.

•The Crown and Care Act, which allows individuals to sue businesses that knowingly sell hair care products with harmful chemicals in them.

•The Arbitration Reform for State Employees Act of 2026, which mandates that a neutral arbitrator be selected to oversee the process when state employees collectively bargain for pay raises

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This story was originally published April 28, 2026 at 4:21 PM.