Michigan Voters Are Too Savvy To Help Trump Win Again

Crook Of The Decade

What a drag it is getting older

When Trump entered the White House, a majority of Michigan’s congressional seats was he’d by the GOP. The Republicans also controlled both chambers of the state legislature. The governor, attorney general and secretary of state were all Republicans. And the majority of the Supreme Court justices were Republicans. Michigan voters saw what happens with Republican rule, especially with Trump at the top of the heap. Today, the governor, attorney general and secretary of state are all Democrats who have been reelected to second terms. The Democrats control both houses of the state legislature— and, more important, have used their majorities to pass popular legislation to control gun violence, scrap abortion bans, protect workers rights to organize, and they have also extended civil rights protections to gay and transgender Michiganders, cut taxes on residents receiving pensions and targeted tax relief for the working class. The Democrats also now have a majority of the congressional seats and a majority on the state Supreme Court.

On Sunday, Trump spoke for an hour at the Oakland County annual Republican Party Lincoln Day Dinner, repeating false claims of widespread fraud in the 2020 election, once more casting the criminal charges and ongoing investigations he faces as a "witch hunt," blasting efforts to support the auto industry’s transition to electric vehicles as a "maniacal push" by Democrats that will “decimate" jobs in Michigan and mocking Meatball Ron, who has far more support than Trump does from members of the state legislature. The County Republicans had agreed to give him a “Man of the Decade” award in return for him helping them raise money.

He gave the same tired stump speech he gives everywhere: “We're going to finish what we started and we will make America great again… This is the final battle. With you at my side, we will demolish the deep state,” nothing the long-in-the-tooth entertainer hasn’t used before. His material is getting stale and Michigan Republican Party officials are painfully aware of it. Aging far right rocker Ted Nugent also did the version of “The Star Spangled Banner” he blatantly stole from Jimi Hendrix’s 1969 Woodstock performance and told attendees they had a "moral obligation" to urge everyone they know to vote for Trump whose election he said was the "only way to save America." In a brief moment of drama, the power went out. In the dark room, one man chanted "U.S.A." Many in the crowd wished it was Lady Gaga or Whitney Houston performing “The Star Spangled Banner” instead of the over-the-hill, off-the-rails Nugent.

“In 2016,” reported Clara Hendrickson, “Trump won Michigan without Oakland County, which hasn't backed a Republican presidential candidate since 1992. Trump's victory in 2016 was a narrow one: he beat Democrat Hillary Clinton by 10,704-vote margin in Michigan. But in his 2020 bid for reelection, Trump lost by more than 154,000 votes to Biden. Biden flipped Kent, Saginaw and Leelanau counties and took Oakland County 434,148 (56.2%) to 325,971 (42.2%), about 5 points higher than Hillary’s 2016 score.

During Trump's speech, he outlined his vision if re-elected: End the Russia-Ukraine war, investigate district attorneys and attorneys general he deems "radical" and cut federal funding to schools whose approach to teaching about race and gender he disagrees with were among some of the priorities he laid out.

The crowd booed when he mentioned Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and the battery plant projects she’s touted involving companies with ties to China that are slated to receive hundreds of millions in state support.

The biggest applause came when he suggested that his political "enemies" were attacking him because they ultimately want to silence his supporters and take away their freedoms.

"In the end, they’re not after me, they're after you," he said.

Sunday, Anjali Huynh reported that the Michigan GOP “is at a crossroads, with internal disputes among Trump-aligned factions whose candidates have faced a series of losses in recent years and an establishment wing that has all but lost any semblance of power. Trump’s full-throated embrace of election denialism and a crusade against ‘wokeism,’ echoed by his most ardent supporters, have left some Michigan Republicans wondering about his chances in a general election— and if there is any possibility of stopping his candidacy before then… Establishment Republicans have raised concerns that Trump himself is to blame for sustained losses, and that Michigan will slowly lose its swing-state status with his loyalists at the helm. Kristina Karamo, a Republican who ran unsuccessfully for secretary of state in 2022 and made voter fraud and election denial central to her campaign, won control of the state party apparatus in February.”

“Trump decapitated the entire Republican establishment in Michigan,” said Jason Roe, a former executive director of the Michigan Republican Party who plans to support another candidate in the growing Republican primary field for president.

“The reality is that other than Donald Trump’s surprise victory in 2016, all he’s done is lose,” Roe added. “So at some point, conservative voters in America have to decide if they want to be loyal to Donald Trump or if they care about the future of our country.”

… Doubts that the state party leadership can steer Republicans to victory in 2024 have become increasingly widespread— party activists are discussing how to generate funding outside the party apparatus, said Jamie Roe, a Republican strategist in the state, who is unrelated to Jason Roe.

“I don’t think they’re communicating very effectively with the broad base of the party,” he said. “I just think that we have opportunity, and I’m praying that we don’t forgo those opportunities.”

The last poll of Michigan Republicans I saw— albeit before DeSantis made such a hash of his campaign rollout— showed DeSantis beating Trump in the state, 47-42%, especially among voters over 65, the most reliable primary voters. I wonde4r if speeches like this one that he gave in Novi Sunday night could have anything to do with that.