MI Governor 2018

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Politico on Abdul El-Sayed.

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Has Abdul El-Sayed actually received any traction, or are you guys just pearl-clutching at the thought of "purity progressives" as usual? As far as I know, El-Sayed is polling in the single digits and doesn't look like a real threat to Whitmer, but if the Left has indeed lined up behind him, I can't say I'm surprised, considering that he's running on (IIRC) a platform that includes support for single-payer and a $15 minimum wage.

Per Politico, he's "pulling out of high single digits," so charitably he's in the low 10s, which is less than half of Whitmer.

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Wow! Congrats Democratic nominee El-Sayed!

That'd be nice

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Calley in.

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 Duggan is not-so-secretly trying to recruit a more viable challenger

There's some interesting info there, particularly:

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And:

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Peters passed.

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Whitmer was easily leading Duggan in the polls, so I can see why he's trying to get somebody ELSE to run against her.

Far as I know, there's not been a poll pitting the two against one another directly. In mid-November, shortly after Duggan was re-elected as mayor, there was a poll showing him up 15 over Schutte in a hypothetical matchup, while Whitmer was tied.

But yes, he probably would jump in himself if his internals were indicative of a good result. Shame, too.

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^ thanks! That's embarrassing that I missed that in the article that I posted. 

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Duggan endorses Whitmer.

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I’m on board with Whitmer. I think she’ll be a repeat of Ralph Northam where everybody panicked and he ended up winning by a bigger margin than the polls showed.

I don't really have much of an issue with Whitmer, tbh. She's more centrist than I'd like, plus it'd be great to finally have some Muslim representation in higher government, which is why I support El-Sayed.

But iirc, Whitmer was the left's favorite in the shadow primary when Levin retired, so she's not exactly Northam V2.

Duggan's endorsement isn't changing my mind, but I'm much more comfortable with Whitmer now. At least it's not perennial joke candidate Fieger.

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Thanedar spotted at a Rubio 2016 campaign event and posed with Rubio: https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/michigan/2018/05/24/thanedar-rubio-rally-no-crime/642027002/

Also, Kzihr Khan (of DNC fame) endorsed El-Sayed, in what is perhaps this cycle's least consequential endorsement.

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Are Michigan roads seriously that bad? I read that Gretchen Whitmer has basically made "Fix the damn roads" her slogan too.

The roads around Detroit are in pretty bad shape. Although they've been that way for years.

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Thanedar’s latest ad is one of the worst I’ve ever seen:

https://youtube.com/watch?v=IEw1q1Tgy2s

Weird angle to go at. Machine politics arent really prevalent in MI, but I guess this is him trying to go for that "Im Bernie Sanders, Whitmer is Hillary Clinton, forget about that other guy" angle. This could work, with a different person, in a different state. Hell, OC could have used this ad, and it would have worked.

Yeah, rich entrepreneur who didn't know if he should run as a Democrat or republican, who attended a Rubio rally and who likely donated enough to get a photo with Rubio is definitely a Sanders stand-in. Don't pay any attention to the guy whose campaign is being run by Sanders's campaign alum.

AOC endorses AES, who also becomes the first gubernatorial candidate on the Justice Semocrats slate:

https://twitter.com/Ocasio2018/status/1013811619145633794

AOC is the f*¢king best. But El-Sayed was endorsed by the justice dems months ago, iirc.

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El-Sayed our with an amazing ad:

https://twitter.com/abdulelsayed/status/1022620319952056322?s=21

This is great. Wish I still lived in Michigan.

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Whitmer and El-Sayed are both A-tier candidates (Thanedar is one of the worst candidates of the cycle, but that's neither here nor there.)

Barring a major shift, Whitmer's winning the nomination, though. I really hope she at least considers picking El-Sayed as a running mate though.

She’s almost certainly going to pick a black man, after Pat Miles didn’t get the AG nomination.

Abdul definitely shouldn’t go away after this. He should run for Congress or challenge Peters or something.

He’s pretty young, isn’t he? Plenty of opportunities ahead of him. Hell he could even run for Mayor of Detroit, he’d be better than a litany of machine hacks

Mayor is possible, but word is he had a sizeable falling out with Duggan, who's still really popular in Detroit. It's possible, of course, to win but he'd be up against a lot of machinery in Detroit. It's a shame that Conyers's seat is up now; otherwise, it'd be a reasonable move in the likely event that he loses this primary.