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    • Michigan voters reflect nation’s divided mood in presidential election
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    Michigan voters reflect nation’s divided mood in presidential election

    Pabio Posted on

    Polls closed at 8 p.m. Tuesday in the majority of Michigan’s 83 counties, leaving the country waiting to hear how state voters would settle a historic and contentious White House race between Democrat Kamala Harris and Republican Donald Trump.

    It’s unclear how long it will take election officials to count all the ballots in Michigan. But the first results should soon begin to be published online. And Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson said turnout could exceed the 2020 record of nearly 5.6 million voters.

    Harris, the current vice president of California, and Trump, the former president who resides in Florida, have made Michigan the center of their campaigns. Harris, Trump and their running mates, Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Republican U.S. Sen. JD Vance, have held more than 60 events in the state this year.

    While Democratic and Republican voters said Tuesday that they believe their preferred candidate has a chance to secure Michigan’s 15 electoral votes, they gave divergent answers on the key issues in the contest.

    More: 2024 Michigan Election: Polls close in most of Michigan

    Carol Wyman, a 73-year-old from Farmington Hills, was campaigning on Election Day in support of Democrats outside the Novi Civic Center in Oakland County on Tuesday. Wyman said she had not been involved in politics for many years before re-engaging ahead of the 2024 race.

    “I think it’s critical to save our democracy,” Wyman said of Harris. “And I think our hope for our future lies in Kamala and Tim Walz.”

    However, in Fenton, Joe Hoffman, a 38-year-old firefighter, said he favored Trump because of the former president’s proposal to eliminate taxes on service industry workers’ tips and allow people to write off interest paid on auto loans on their taxable income.

    “And he took a bullet, man,” Hoffman said of Trump. “That’s dedication.”

    THE July 13 assassination attempt Trump’s victory in Pennsylvania and the fact that incumbent Democratic President Joe Biden ended his re-election bid on July 21, allowing Harris to become the nominee, were two of the events that made the contest 2024 extraordinary.

    Michigan has been at the forefront of the campaign with Harris and Trump, along with their running mates, aggressively seeking to win over the state’s voters with dozens of appearances this year. Trump held his final rally of the race in Grand Rapids, speaking at Van Andel Arena early Tuesday morning.

    “If we win Michigan, we’ll win everything,” Trump said.

    More: Trump wins nine states, Harris claims five as elections close in parts of the United States

    In 2016, Trump became the first Republican presidential candidate since 1988 to win Michigan, defeating Democrat Hillary Clinton by 10,704 votes. or about 0.2 percentage points, on the way to the White House. Four years later, Biden defeated Trump in his re-election bid and won Michigan by 154,188 votes, or 3 percentage points, 51% to 48%.

    But the Republican’s supporters attempted to overturn the 2020 results, and he maintained unproven and false claims that widespread fraud was to blame for his loss.

    Harris made his final campaign run in Michigan on Sunday, telling the crowd at Michigan State University that the momentum of the race was on his side.

    “Do you feel it? And we have this momentum because our campaign taps into the ambitions, aspirations and dreams of the American people,” Harris said.

    Wyman, a Harris supporter, said women’s rights was one of the issues that inspired her activism this fall.

    “Losing Roe v. Wade, to me, was incredible,” she said of the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision. who overturned a decision that has protected access to abortion nationwide for nearly 50 years.

    Likewise, on the campus of Michigan State University in East Lansing, abortion rights were also on the mind of 26-year-old graduate student Kaela Panicucci, who voted for Harris. As she left a polling station at the University United Methodist Church, Panicucci said she hoped female voters would lead the Democratic candidate to victory in Michigan.

    “I feel like as a woman it’s especially important that I vote in this election,” she said.

    If Harris wins, she will become the first female president of the United States.

    During his first term in the White House, Trump appointed three justices to the United States Supreme Court who ruled in favor of overturning Roe v. Wade in June 2022. Trump touted the high court’s decision during his campaign this year, but said he would leave policy choices on abortion to individual states.

    Harris said she would sign legislation to enshrine Roe v. Wade’s abortion access protections into federal law.

    Cody Collins, 42, who lives in Grand Haven and works at a local manufacturer, also voted for Harris. Collins said he traditionally supports Republicans and voted for Republican U.S. Senate candidate Mike Rogers. “I think Donald Trump is just about the biggest piece of trash lying I’ve ever heard,” said Collins, who added that he voted for Trump in 2016. “He goes on national television and talks, and he thinks we’re all so stupid…that we don’t know it. He’s completely lying to us and I don’t like it.

    Michigan voters who showed up to vote for Trump cited the economy and his handling of foreign affairs among their reasons.

    Tawfeeq Majid, 29, of Dearborn, had the economy on his mind when he voted for Trump Saturday morning. The independent truck driver said business was better under the previous administration.

    “It was Donald Trump who came to mind” in the voting booth, Majid said.

    “It has stimulated the economy. There has been a slowdown (under the Biden-Harris administration). There is not as much work available,” Majid said.

    Michael Altherr, 58, of Grosse-Île Township, said he supported Trump in all three elections in which he ran for president.

    Altherr said he believes Biden’s administration is largely to blame for rising inflation. The economy was better under Trump, Altherr argued.

    “There’s a split screen of what it is today and what it was back then,” Altherr said.

    At Michigan State University, 21-year-old Ryan Gieleghem voted in his first presidential election Tuesday. He had registered to vote in East Lansing on Monday. Gieleghem declined to say which candidate he supported, but said he knew students who were on both sides of the divide.

    “I think there’s a lot of angst on this campus, and there’s also a lot of anxiety,” Gieleghem said. “I think people feel like a lot depends on this election.”

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    Staff writers Melissa Nann Burke, Julia Cardi, Breana Noble and political editor Chad Livengood contributed.

    Pabio
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