Republican county commissioner has been unseated in Michigan after losing to her Democratic challenger by 20 percentage points.

Chris Kleinjans won an Ottawa County election on Tuesday with 60 percent of the vote share, while the Republican incumbent Lucy Ebel lost, having received 40 percent.

Michigan is a battleground state that will be key to November’s presidential election. Donald Trump won the county with 61 percent of the vote in 2020.

  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Michigan is a battleground state that will be key to November’s presidential election.

    Friendly reminder that, thanks to the US-backed genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, we saw fully 13% of Democrats refuse to support Joe Biden in the Michigan primary

    This, in a state where Democrat primary turnout was 768,158 relative to Republican primary turnout of 1,113,719.

    This war is going to Jimmy Carter the Democrats in November, if they don’t change course in a hurry.

    • rbesfe@lemmy.ca
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      6 months ago

      13% of democrats submitted a protest vote. That is not the same as refusing to vote for Biden in November. I hope that anyone who supports the Palestinian cause can recognize just how much worse it will get under a Trump administration.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        That is not the same as refusing to vote for Biden in November.

        That’s a clear signal by registered Democrats of their abstention of support for Biden.

        House Reps aren’t seeing these huge protest votes.

        I hope that anyone who supports the Palestinian cause can recognize just how much worse it will get under a Trump

        I hope that Biden realizes he can’t wait until 2025 to change course in Palestine. Not when 1.4M lives are on the line.

        • Telodzrum@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          Not really, this is the damage to your brain that insufficient evidence can cause. Michigan has a storied history of large “Uncommitted” votes in uncontested primaries. For example, “Uncommitted” picked up 16.08% of the vote against Obama in 2012. If anything, this is evidence that support for Biden is stronger that would be expected in Michigan.

          Also, you claim it’s evidence that registered Democrats are abandoning Biden; Michigan has an open primary.

          • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            Michigan has a storied history of large “Uncommitted” votes in uncontested primaries.

            For example, “Uncommitted” picked up 16.08% of the vote against Obama in 2012.

            They picked up 10% and in an election year with 70% lower turnout. And Obama shed 300k votes from his 2008 high. Incidentally, Hillary shed 300,000 additional votes relative to Obama’s 2012 performance. A state that was safely blue decayed to red thanks to growing dissatisfaction in the Dem base. It wasn’t until 2020 that Dems recovered.

            Also, you claim it’s evidence that registered Democrats are abandoning Biden

            If voting against the incumbent isn’t a sign of abandonment, I’m not sure what else is. Certainly the Nikki Haley Republicans are a shot across Trump’s bow.

            Perhaps Dems are just banking on a historically low turnout year overall. But no matter how you slice it, Biden’s support has waned considerably from 2020. He’s not going to hit that 2.8M mark again.

      • mlg@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Lol unless Biden changes course, SE Michigan alone will ensure his loss of the state.

        Dearborn does not screw around and will happily take 4 years of Trump if their demands are not met. They were very aware of Hillary’s sketchy past as Secretary of State when she ran in 2016 and she lost Michigan because only 10k people didn’t vote for her.

        And iirc the total turnout was already like 400k less compared to Obama.