Daniel Lewis Cox (born August 9, 1974) is an American politician and lawyer who was a Republican member of the Maryland House of Delegates representing the fourth district from 2019 to 2023.

[3] In 2024, Cox unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. House of Representatives in Maryland's 6th congressional district, losing to former state delegate Neil Parrott in the Republican primary election.

[18][19] Cox ran on a platform that included establishing a division to help fathers gain visitation, ensuring mothers received child support, and refusing to issue licenses for same-sex marriages, which were not legal in Maryland at the time.

[27] In November 2018, electioneering complaints were filed against Cox after he recorded a video of himself within 100 feet of an early voting center in Thurmont, which is prohibited by Maryland election law.

"[3][37][38] After receiving backlash, Cox tweeted and retweeted false claims blaming antifa for the attack on the Capitol, and expressed his support for Enrique Tarrio, the leader of the Proud Boys, an extremist group with nationalist, neofascist and self-proclaimed Western-chauvinist views.

[42][43] The Frederick County Democratic Central Committee began a letter-writing campaign calling for Cox to be expelled from the House of Delegates for his false claims.

[47] In May 2022, a lawsuit was filed against Maryland Elections Administrator Linda Lamone, seeking to remove Cox from the 2022 Republican primary ballot for his presence during the Capitol attack.

[65][66][67] Following his primary win, Cox sought to distance himself from the January 6 insurrection and former president Donald Trump, removing references to his endorsement from his website and making adjustments to his biography and issues pages.

[82][83][84][85] On September 23, 2022, a Montgomery County Circuit Court judge ruled in favor of the board, allowing it to begin counting mail-in ballots on October 1.

[91][92] In an opinion written by Chief Justice Matthew J. Fader in March 2023, the court held that a section of the state's Election Law Article referenced in his lawsuit did not "violate the separation of powers guaranteed in the Maryland Constitution's Declaration of Rights".

[108] In June 2023, Judge Stephanie A. Gallagher denied a motion to dismiss the charges against Krop,[109] in which Cox alleged that the indictment was "politically motivated" and questioned the Ukrainian citizenship of the lead ATF agent in the case.

[110][111] Jenkins' attorneys also criticized Cox's motion, saying that he was employing "inconsistent, even hostile, defense strategies" and asking to be tried separately from Krop,[112] which was granted on August 31, 2023.

[118] If appointed to the seat and confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Cox told The Baltimore Sun that his priorities would include prosecuting sex trafficking and criminal gangs, such as MS-13, and ensuring Maryland elections are "transparent".

[4] Cox was seen as a frontrunner, alongside former state delegate Neil Parrott, in the Republican primary,[124] during which he sought to associate himself with former president Donald Trump,[125][126] calling the ongoing criminal cases against Trump a "witch hunt" and continuing to promote disproven conspiracy theories that the 2020 presidential election was marred by fraud,[124] and ran on a platform including immigration, crime, and opposing COVID-19 pandemic health restrictions.

[133] During his first term in the legislature, Cox introduced fourteen bills that would restrict abortion access and offered budget amendments to remove state funding for the procedure.

[135] In June 2022, Cox praised the Supreme Court's ruling in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, which overturned Roe v. Wade and Planned Parenthood v.

Cox said he considered reducing effluent from bay area sewage systems and ending silt pouring from the Conowingo Dam to be a "top priority".

[148] In April 2020, Cox posted a portion of the state constitution on his Facebook page after Maryland governor Larry Hogan issued an executive order implementing a stay-at-home directive.

[150] U.S. District Court Judge Catherine Blake struck down his lawsuit on May 20, 2020, saying that the state and country are "now in the grip of a public health crisis more severe than any seen for a hundred years.

[157] The family's request for a temporary restraining order to allow them to vote without wearing masks was rejected by Harford County Circuit Judge Angela M.

[162] In August 2021, Cox used his Facebook page to ask his constituents to e-mail the Maryland Board of Education to demand that they reject an emergency universal masking mandate regulation for the 2021–2022 academic year.

[171] In June 2022, Cox released a crime plan on Truth Social that called for allowing "modified stop and frisk" policies and enacting broken windows policing.

[172] Cox has expressed interest in establishing a "prosecutorial board" to work with elected leaders in Baltimore and other crime-challenged areas to keep violent criminals in prisons.

[145] During his gubernatorial campaign, Cox unveiled a "Defending Parental Rights" education platform that would ban teaching children in kindergarten through third grade about gender identity, calling it "indoctrination.

"[180] When asked to elaborate his definition of "indoctrination", he cited asexual and nonbinary author Maia Kobabe's memoirs Gender Queer, which he claimed depicts "things that I cannot show you on television, it's so disgusting.

[184] On Holocaust Remembrance Day in April 2021, Cox said he would vote against a bill to allow minors to consent to some health care services, comparing it to the infringement of "the rights of parents" by Nazis.

[185] Cox defended his remarks in a letter accusing his colleagues of twisting the words he used during an emotionally-charged floor debate to gain partisan advantage, and offered no apology for his comments.

During the House debate before the bill's final vote, Cox read off a list of offenses that local law enforcement agencies would not be able to use to pass undocumented people over to ICE after they completed sentences for their crimes.

"[197] In April 2001, Cox and his wife Valerie wrote a letter to The Dorchester Star about the state's Administration Act of 2001 (SB 205), which would ban discrimination against people based on their sexual identity.

In the letter, they argued that the bill would violate the rights of "business owners ... who firmly believe homosexuality is sin and those who practice it are in danger of temporal disease and eternal death.