MI-Sen 2026: Peters retiring

[Big Zuck]

McMorrow will officially enter this race as early as today, from the AP.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

Great news

[Atlas Force]

Yeah this is how you stop Pete. Get in sooner instead of later, lock up those endorsements, and don’t give him room to gain ground.

[Steve from Lambeth]

Can someone please ELI5 why the State Senate's Majority Whip is seen as quite possibly the most viable candidate in a race where the name of almost every statewide official has been floated at one point or another? This is the Democrats' first Senate majority since 1984 and they only have a 20-18 majority so two defections on any bill could be fatal (Gilchrist breaks ties) - were there any rebels she had to sort out or has the caucus been united anyway?

Is this going to be a Bill Clinton 1992 situation where a B-tier but cult-status candidate manages to win because she is an enthusiastic, focused character in a race that none of the bona-fide A-listers are interested in?

She went viral for her vigorous response to anti-LGBT bills proposed by MI republicans a few years ago and has been seen as a rising star since; she spoke at the DNC and highlighted Project 2025.

So Donald Trump made #Resist Libism 2.0 real, then. Got it

Great news

And here I was thinking you were Pete's biggest fan. Booooooooo.

[KakyoinMemeHouse]

Yeah this is how you stop Pete. Get in sooner instead of later, lock up those endorsements, and don’t give him room to gain ground.

I don't get the insistence on "stopping" Pete.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

Pete hasn't announced yet

[Storr]

McMorrow will officially enter this race as early as today, from the AP.

Hopefully this doesn’t matter in a typical 2026 non-Presidential party midterm scenario, where you’d think Michigan Dems increase their state senate majority, making a single state senate seat less important. But the Michigan Senate is currently 19D - 18R - 1 vacant. (The vacancy being Kristen McDonald Rivet’s seat she vacated after being elected to Congress last year.) McMorrow being in a Safe D state senate seat and potentially being elected to the US senate means that Michigan Dems won’t have to worry about losing a marginal seat due to an incumbent winning election to a higher office, like happened with Slotkin’s Congressional seat in 2024 and potentially McDonald Rivet’s state senate seat in its upcoming special election.

[ShadowRocket]

McMorrow will officially enter this race as early as today, from the AP.

Hopefully this doesn’t matter in a typical 2026 non-Presidential party midterm scenario, where you’d think Michigan Dems increase their state senate majority, making a single state senate seat less important. But the Michigan Senate is currently 19D - 18R - 1 vacant. (The vacancy being Kristen McDonald Rivet’s seat she vacated after being elected to Congress last year.) McMorrow being in a Safe D state senate seat and potentially being elected to the US senate means that Michigan Dems won’t have to worry about losing a marginal seat due to an incumbent winning election to a higher office, like happened with Slotkin’s Congressional seat in 2024 and potentially McDonald Rivet’s state senate seat in its upcoming special election.

That shouldn't be a concern.  MI has a two-term limit on state senators and her term is up in 2026 anyways.

[Tekken_Guy]

McMorrow will officially enter this race as early as today, from the AP.

Hopefully this doesn’t matter in a typical 2026 non-Presidential party midterm scenario, where you’d think Michigan Dems increase their state senate majority, making a single state senate seat less important. But the Michigan Senate is currently 19D - 18R - 1 vacant. (The vacancy being Kristen McDonald Rivet’s seat she vacated after being elected to Congress last year.) McMorrow being in a Safe D state senate seat and potentially being elected to the US senate means that Michigan Dems won’t have to worry about losing a marginal seat due to an incumbent winning election to a higher office, like happened with Slotkin’s Congressional seat in 2024 and potentially McDonald Rivet’s state senate seat in its upcoming special election.

That shouldn't be a concern.  MI has a two-term limit on state senators and her term is up in 2026 anyways.

They changed the law in 2022 to a cumulative House+Senate 12 years and McMorrow never served in the MI House.

Also I'm wondering if Stevens took herself out of the running? Because McMorrow probably would run for MI-11 if it was open.

[Fascism Must Be Defeated]

Does McMorrow have any crossover appeal at all though? She's a hyperpartisan millennial Dem.

Aka the kind of people we need in politics. And plenty of quite partisan people have won elections in swing states, as neighboring Wisconsin shows.

[He's turned to dust now, one of the chosen few]

And plenty of quite partisan people have won elections in swing states, as neighboring Wisconsin shows.

Pepperidge Farm remembers "Pat Toomey is way too deep in the Tea Party Kool-Aid to win in hashtag moderate swing state Pennsylvania"

[Horus]

I don't get the McMorrow appeal, can someone explain it to me? She's seems very plain and unremarkable.

[Gass3268]

Buttigieg has a big early lead

https://twitter.com/DavidEggert00/status/1886832124436562160

[Progressive Pessimist]

Yeah this is how you stop Pete. Get in sooner instead of later, lock up those endorsements, and don’t give him room to gain ground.

I don't get the insistence on "stopping" Pete.

His carpetbagging and proven lack of appeal to minorities might compromise Democrats holding this seat if he is nominated. Too risky.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

Yeah this is how you stop Pete. Get in sooner instead of later, lock up those endorsements, and don’t give him room to gain ground.

I don't get the insistence on "stopping" Pete.

His carpetbagging and proven lack of appeal to minorities might compromise Democrats holding this seat if he is nominated. Too risky.

Lol I support Buttigieg I am a minority and in a Trump midterm, Blks will galvanized behind any D

[Mr. Smith]

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/politics/2025/02/03/michigan-garlin-gilchrist-eyes-governor-bid-abdul-el-sayed-weighs-senate-run-pete-buttigieg/78183907007/

This article indicates that 2018 Dem primary runner up Abdul El-Sayed is mulling a run. Buttigieg would probably have significant issues if he ran but there's still a decent path for him. However I think El-Sayed as nominee would turn this race into lean R.

Good news then that if runs it probably won't be as successful as his 2018 primary run - since back then he had all the Progressives - and that time he lost by 20 points and in every county.

Split vote by Shri Thanedar (now in Congress) that year.

[Spectator]

Yeah this is how you stop Pete. Get in sooner instead of later, lock up those endorsements, and don’t give him room to gain ground.

I don't get the insistence on "stopping" Pete.

His carpetbagging and proven lack of appeal to minorities might compromise Democrats holding this seat if he is nominated. Too risky.

I also wouldnt expect kakyomeme to have good political instincts considering her 2024 predictions.

[coloradocowboi]

Buttigieg has a big early lead

https://twitter.com/DavidEggert00/status/1886832124436562160

This is the problem. Dem primary voters are a tiny, tiny minority of the country with really idiosyncratic tastes.

Yeah this is how you stop Pete. Get in sooner instead of later, lock up those endorsements, and don’t give him room to gain ground.

I don't get the insistence on "stopping" Pete.

For example, Pete Buttigieg is a wealthy, privilege baby, a carpetbagger, snide, condescending, ideologically unmoored to anything but his own intelligence. He reminds the most loyal primary voters of themselves, but the problem is he is not relatable to working class people. His "fiscally conservative, socially liberal" politics have been BTFO by Trump twice now. His substitution of class solidarity for us vs. them identity politics not only alienates working-class white people, but also potentially Black and Hispanic people who don't want to be condescended to by some rich, white gay guy about their oppression. Even his ties to our LGBTQ community are weak. For all the reason upper middle class ppl love him, working class ppl find him suspicious. And guess who outnumbers who in a place like Michigan?

Now, if Pete and Chasten wanna move to Jefferson County, Colorado, he's a perfect fit! But Michigan? H*** no!

I don't get the McMorrow appeal, can someone explain it to me? She's seems very plain and unremarkable.

I worry she's of the same ilk. And tbh her main standout feature is identical to Pete's: she's a pugilist who is good on a mic. I would've much rather seen Gilchrist go for this one, but I think the DNC probably muscled him out. And I do think McMorrow has more crossover appeal than Buttigieg merely by virtue of not being the poster-child of snide, condescending neoliberalism.

She's also a lot more progressive, which I honestly think is a plus at this point. People can believe what they want, but as someone who worked on Hillary 2016 I think it's clear that the Third Way types have been and continue to be wrong. "Fiscally conservative, socially liberal" is dead. We can either move on and try something different (which btw includes not kneecapping our own candidates constantly cuz they dare to defy our donors) or we can nominate Pete, watch him win the lay-up of a midterm, and then see the same politics he represents lose 55-45 to JD Vance in 2028. Insanity is trying the same thing again and again, failing, and not altering one's course.

[Spectator]

I don't get the McMorrow appeal, can someone explain it to me? She's seems very plain and unremarkable.

I don’t understand it either, but then again I also don’t understand the appeal of Pete Buttigieg and Dems apparently love him. Usually Dems are the strategic primary voters, so a Buttigieg nomination would be a marked break from that. If you want someone edgy/trigger the cons while also having proven themselves statewide, why not go with Nessel?

[ponderosa peen 🌲]

I don't get the McMorrow appeal, can someone explain it to me? She's seems very plain and unremarkable.

I don’t understand it either, but then again I also don’t understand the appeal of Pete Buttigieg and Dems apparently love him. Usually Dems are the strategic primary voters, so a Buttigieg nomination would be a marked break from that. If you want someone edgy/trigger the cons while also having proven themselves statewide, why not go with Nessel?

It probably comes from the perception that Buttigieg is a talented politician and public servant with obvious Presidential ambitions, and putting him in the Senate is the least-resistance path to elevating him to a future Presidential win. Not a case I 100% agree with but that's the logic.

The McMorrow appeal is solely a strategic desire to block Buttigieg. She doesn't have the same carpet-baggage as Buttigieg but aside from that I don't see her really expanding the base that much.

Personally Nessel I think would be good too but I'm still not seeing her as a home run.

[DaleCooper]

Very disturbing news. I'm not worried too much about Pete losing the election, because for all his faults he is talented and will likely beat whatever ghoul he's up against in a midterm, but this is another slap in the face to the growing number of people who used to be Democrats. It's only going to get harder to win these people back. And the Dems must win them back, there is no future without at least some of the Obama-Trump, Hillary-Trump, or Biden-Trump voters. Who else can they even persuade at this point?

[Existing in the context]

I kind of have to agree that Gilchrist probably would've been the one to rally around in an anti-Pete campaign. I think the fear is Mallory might be cut from the same cloth. They both kind of reprsent the Democrats moving toward a more white, wealthy, metropolitan base thats driven by social desireablity and cosmopolitanism. I mean they both not from here. His parents are college professors and she grew up in Hunterdon county. She will likely lose a primary to him even if 1 v 1 just on his name ID alone. There isn't anything different she brings that can effectively knock Pete out that he couldn't skillfully turn back at here.

[Devils30]

Very disturbing news. I'm not worried too much about Pete losing the election, because for all his faults he is talented and will likely beat whatever ghoul he's up against in a midterm, but this is another slap in the face to the growing number of people who used to be Democrats. It's only going to get harder to win these people back. And the Dems must win them back, there is no future without at least some of the Obama-Trump, Hillary-Trump, or Biden-Trump voters. Who else can they even persuade at this point?

Pete could absolutely lose to someone like Huizenga or Rogers. GOP just needs a non-crazy normie but MAGA friendly enough Republican who will point out Pete an Ivy leaguer who isn't one of them.

[Mr.Bakari-Sellers]

Very disturbing news. I'm not worried too much about Pete losing the election, because for all his faults he is talented and will likely beat whatever ghoul he's up against in a midterm, but this is another slap in the face to the growing number of people who used to be Democrats. It's only going to get harder to win these people back. And the Dems must win them back, there is no future without at least some of the Obama-Trump, Hillary-Trump, or Biden-Trump voters. Who else can they even persuade at this point?

Pete could absolutely lose to someone like Huizenga or Rogers. GOP just needs a non-crazy normie but MAGA friendly enough Republican who will point out Pete an Ivy leaguer who isn't one of them.

Ds aren't losing in a D3 Environment in a Trump Midterm

[Devils30]

Very disturbing news. I'm not worried too much about Pete losing the election, because for all his faults he is talented and will likely beat whatever ghoul he's up against in a midterm, but this is another slap in the face to the growing number of people who used to be Democrats. It's only going to get harder to win these people back. And the Dems must win them back, there is no future without at least some of the Obama-Trump, Hillary-Trump, or Biden-Trump voters. Who else can they even persuade at this point?

Pete could absolutely lose to someone like Huizenga or Rogers. GOP just needs a non-crazy normie but MAGA friendly enough Republican who will point out Pete an Ivy leaguer who isn't one of them.

Ds aren't losing in a D3 Environment in a Trump Midterm

They shouldn't but just because the GOP nominated clowns in 2022 senate races doesn't mean Dems are immune from weak candidates. Especially if economy is good.