On the record: Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer sounds off on court reform, port modernization and Trump

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Delaware’s new governor, Matt Meyer, is in his first couple of months in office. He’s already issued an executive order to increase transparency in office, declared a “literacy emergency” after Delaware saw record-low eighth-grade reading scores and released guidance on immigrant student rights.

In a wide-ranging interview with WHYY News last month, Meyer discussed a variety of issues, including the Port of Wilmington, court reform, transparency, labor unions and working with President Donald Trump’s administration.

The conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

WHYY News: You have issued an executive order on transparency. What kind of plans do you hope state agencies come back to you about being more transparent?

Gov. Matt Meyer: First of all, we’ve got to be transparent and accountable to the public. The public has a right to know every dollar that we spend is their money. It’s your money, it’s my money. And the days of trying to hide various things that are going on have to be in our past, so that’s sort of the first thing, just complete transparency. The second piece is about high-quality government, making sure we’re looking at the functions that government performs and making sure we’re performing them in efficient ways.

WHYY News: There is legislation creating an inspector general that’s currently sitting in the Senate executive committee. Do you support that legislation?

Meyer: I don’t know if we’ve taken a position on that legislation yet. We either support it or will support some tweaked version of it, but I believe strongly it is time for an inspector general in Delaware.

WHYY News: Some companies, including Meta, Dropbox and Pershing Square Capital Management, have discussed incorporating elsewhere. What can you do as a governor to keep companies in Delaware? (Note: Since this interview took place, state lawmakers introduced legislation to make changes to Delaware corporate law that would limit lawsuits against corporate leaders.)

Meyer: Delaware is unquestionably the preeminent jurisdiction for incorporation, not just in the country, but in the world. Two-thirds of the Fortune 500 are incorporated in Delaware. Eighty-one percent of the United States’ initial public offerings, IPOs, last year in 2024 were Delaware incorporated companies. We’re at nearly 2.2 million entities registered in the state. That’s more than double the entire population of our state. That’s a record. So this conventional wisdom, or this idea in the press that the Delaware franchise is somehow in trouble, is not really accurate.

Now, having said that, to retain our competitive advantage in the 21st-century world, we need to take action, and we need to take action quickly. We’re talking to many of the leading corporate attorneys across the world, and identifying what is going well with the Delaware corporate franchise, and things that need to be addressed or improved.

There’s no doubt that there’s some dissatisfaction in many circles, particularly in C-suites. Directors and officers of some of the largest companies in the world have some dissatisfaction with our state’s business court, the Chancery Court. Now it’s clear in almost every case, they say we are still the preeminent place, but it’s certainly come under threat. So what we’re doing is working to understand what some of those issues are. Sometimes they’re relatively minor judicial procedural issues, and sometimes they’re more serious issues that require legal change.

WHYY News: Does this mean that Delaware should add an additional income tax bracket?

Meyer: I have been very clear that I don’t think that when it’s time to raise revenue, I don’t think it makes sense for families making $70,000 a year, Delaware families, to be paying the same state tax rate as families making $70 million a year, and I still stand by that.

WHYY News: What is your relationship with labor unions in the state? And is the fight over the nominees to the Diamond State Port Corporation Board a sign that it’s kind of a rocky relationship?

Meyer: There are so many unions across this state, and to suggest that all of them are involved in the port is simply not accurate. You talk about groups like the teachers union who were integrally and very directly involved in my selection of a secretary of education. Even at the port, you talk about the warehousemen.

This myth that I have some issue with the unions is simply false. It is true that there are a few people whose day jobs as union leaders have been gunning for me since the day I was elected county executive. In fact, before I was elected county executive in 2016. I have, for whatever reason, been enemy No. 1 for them and that seems to extend now to them wanting to pack the port corporation board with members who pretty clearly have been withdrawn from consideration by my office. To have someone who lost a gubernatorial election propose members of a port commission is something that this state has never seen before.

WHYY News: Do you support the Edgemoor project at the Port of Wilmington?

Meyer: We need to modernize our port. For 15 years, we’ve been talking about building a container port. It still has not happened. I have urgency about creating a modern port and making sure that with modernization, we don’t lose the core union workforce that we desperately need. There’s this idea that in order to create good union jobs, we need to take away public transparency and accountability. I think that’s wrong. It’s not a trade-off. We need to have absolute transparency and accountability to the public and we need to grow high-quality union jobs in a modernized port.

WHYY News: You appointed Joanna Champney, the state’s top substance abuse director, as co-chair of the Prescription Opioid Settlement Distribution Commission. There’s been a lot of controversy over the distribution of funds by the commission. What are you hoping to see with this change?

Meyer: Those are critical resources to some of the most vulnerable individuals and communities in our state. We have to make sure 100% that every dollar is being put to use to truly save lives, to prevent the spread of this horrendous epidemic and to treat those individuals and extended families who are bearing the brunt of this scourge on communities not just in Delaware, but across our country.

I think when you look at last year, the way in which the funding was allocated was not based on data, it was not based on a clinical assessment of the epidemic in our communities. What we’re trying to do through my appointment of Joanna Champney, who leads the Division of Substance Abuse and Mental Health in the state Department of Health and Social Services, is say that resources need to go directly to address the epidemic, from prevention and public awareness to emergency response and treatment.

WHYY News: President Donald Trump has also just come into office. Can you talk about what it has been like to balance state and federal concerns?

Meyer: Look, the president is a different party than me. I was not supportive of the president. I am ready, willing and eager to collaborate with the president in any way, to help improve our schools, to help make housing more affordable, to help increase the availability and reduce the cost of health care, to make the delivery of government services more efficient and cost-effective and transparent.

To Delawareans, I also am very concerned that several of the actions already taken — whether it’s a number of executive orders on immigration, executive orders to stop federal funding — have put Delawareans in jeopardy and have caused Delawareans to fear for their safety. So as the Trump administration is doing things like that, we’re going to make sure we’re taking a leading role in protecting Delawareans.

This story was supported by a statehouse coverage grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.