Michigan Democrats Choose Their Opposition Tonight
AIPAC made the biggest single-race bet in its history — and 1.2 million Michiganders voted before it could close.
Michigan Democrats decide tonight what their party is. More than 1.2 million of them decided early — 1,214,251 ballots banked by Monday afternoon, the Secretary of State counted, and the Detroit News tallied the total past 1.3 million by this morning — in the most watched contest of a five-state primary day. Polls close at 8 p.m. ET; the western Upper Peninsula follows at 9.
The seat is open. Gary Peters retires in January, and the two Democrats fighting to replace him agree on stopping Trump — and on almost nothing else. Rep. Haley Stevens, four terms in Congress from Oakland County, carries the endorsement machinery of the Washington and Michigan establishment. Abdul El-Sayed, the physician who ran Wayne County’s health department, carries Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Elizabeth Warren — and, he says, 10,000 volunteers.
Then the money. AIPAC and its affiliates put nearly $30 million behind Stevens, the largest sum the pro-Israel lobby has ever spent on one race, CBS Detroit reported. Outside groups pushed the pro-Stevens total toward $50 million; one of them, A Stronger Michigan, spent roughly $12 million without naming its donors. Through early July, Stevens’ own campaign had spent $12,000 on ads. She is running on money that is not hers, from donors she cannot name.
