DETROIT – Facing dissent from parts of the traditional Democratic base, Vice President Kamala Harris is counting on broad support from suburban voters and former Republicans to overcome a loss.
Nowhere are the stakes higher than in Michigan, a key battleground state angered by Israel’s war in Gaza, with a large Arab population in addition to large black males, young voters and other traditionally Democratic demographics that are trending. away from the party.
Haley Stevens, a Democrat who represents affluent Oakland County outside Detroit, said the energy in places like hers ensures that Harris can overcome any defections from the base and defeat former President Donald Trump.
“It’s a close race and everybody knows that, and so it all comes down to surgery and Harris has it,” he said, referring to the get-out-the-vote effort.
The congressman said he was surprised by the turnout at canvas openings and Democratic events in places like Bloomfield Hills, where Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah grew up, where Democrats have only recently returned but have become powerhouses of liberal volunteerism and donations.
“These are old Republican neighborhoods,” he said. “The Democratic Party has become a religion for many people. It has become a part of their life experience. … Just a few years ago, they were casual Republicans.”
That sentiment helps explain why Harris campaigned in the state with former Republican Liz Cheney and now supports former Rep. Fred Upton, a Republican who represented her southwest Michigan district from 1987 until last year.
Trump won suburban Michigan 51%-48% in 2020, but recent inquiries Show that Harris now leads there by double digits, driven by a realignment of white, college-educated voters and women concerned about abortion rights.
In Macomb County, a Detroit suburb that Trump won in 2016 and 2020, Utica City Councilman Ron Robinson, a Republican running for a competitive Michigan House seat, said there was evidence that Harris was making gains in his district.
“I’ve been to every precinct at least once,” Robinson said in an interview at a campaign event this week. “Harris signs for president more than Biden signs for president. … I mean, say whatever you want. Kamala Harris had an amazing campaign and she definitely connected with a lot of people.”
Nervous energy in Detroit
Polls in Michigan have consistently shown a dead heat between Trump and Harris, with operatives from both parties expressing cautious optimism while admitting it was a coin flip.
“A complete jump ball,” said Dennis Lennox, a Republican strategist who works in Michigan. “Nobody really knows what’s going to happen.”
Outside of the suburbs, Republicans see opportunities to poach traditional Democratic voters like blacks.
“Trump should get about 75 points [mostly rural] he said he was going to win and that he hoped his numbers among black men were not a mirage,” Lennox said.
Former President Barack Obama was greeted by a large and energetic crowd at a get-out-the-vote rally at Detroit’s downtown convention center Tuesday night. Families wore old Obama T-shirts and new Harris prints, chanting the former president’s “Fire up, ready to go!” He was ready for his speech. and “Don’t Boo – Vote”.
But there was a commotion among the people. Pamela, an AT&T retiree and Harris canvasser, who asked that her last name not be used, said she was concerned – As Obama did – Black men resist Harris, the first Black woman to serve in the Oval Office.
“I’ve been going door to door for the last three months and I’ve had a lot of trouble with black men,” said Pamela, who is black. “They’re upset about something.”
Elsewhere at the rally, LaSalle Washington dismissed the idea.
“All these black men won’t vote for her? There may be a few, like if there’s a white woman running, there’s going to be some white women who don’t vote for him, but there’s no hard number,” Washington, 74, said. “I’m a black man. All my friends vote for him. The case is closed.”
Liz Cheney’s endorsement is different
Dissatisfaction over the war in Gaza has intensified among the province’s large Arab and Muslim communities, particularly since Israel’s occupation of southern Lebanon.
End requests Michigan’s Arab Americans are roughly evenly split between Harris and Trump, whereas they’ve typically been closer to 2-to-1 for Democrats in recent elections.
Many families from southern Lebanon immigrated to Dearborn, not far from Detroit, during the Israeli military operations in the 1970s and 1980s. Some US citizens living in Dearborn were killed while tending to a family driven back to Lebanon by Israeli airstrikes in recent weeks. Now many Lebanese American and Palestinian American voters in Michigan say Won’t vote for Harris under any circumstances.
“The No. 1 issue is the conflict in the Middle East,” said Michigan State Rep. Alabas Farhat, a Lebanese-American Democrat who represents Dearborn. “You walk down these streets in Dearborn and knock on the door, and everybody will tell you how they’ve been affected by this conflict.”
Trump capitalized.
“Why should Muslims support the liar Kamala Harris when she embraces Liz Cheney who is a Muslim hater and a very dumb person?” Trump made the remarks at a rally in Michigan last week before touching on Vice President Dick Cheney and the Iraq war. “His father brought many years of war and death to the Middle East. He killed many Arabs.”
Trump’s daughter Tiffany Trump’s father-in-law, Lebanese-American businessman Massad Boulos, led Republicans to present Donald Trump as an anti-war candidate who would bring peace to the Middle East.
Earlier this month, Boulos hosted a glitzy town hall-style event for Middle Eastern voters at the Renaissance Center in downtown Detroit that featured prominent GOP voices such as Trump’s daughter-in-law Lara Trump, co-chair of the Republican National Committee.
Some Muslim and Arab voters say they plan to vote for Trump to punish Democrats, while more will vote for anti-war third-party candidates like Jill Stein. The Reject Harris campaign, made up of Muslim activists, is organizing an aggressive community to vote for anyone but Harris.
‘Giving Republicans a Seat at the Table’
Democrats are confident that they can fix these deficiencies.
Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, a popular Democrat, said she is confident in her party’s primary game in her state. And he expressed his belief that Republican support for Harris, like Upton, could be key to the race.
“I was grateful today that Fred Upton added his name to the growing chorus of Republicans supporting Kamala Harris and Tim Waltz,” Whitmer said Thursday when asked by NBC News at a campaign event in the Detroit suburb of Rochester. “Republicans don’t have to agree with 100% of what we’re proposing, but they’re going to have a seat at the table, and that’s important.”
State Rep. Jennifer Conlin, a Democrat from Ann Arbor, believes there is a silent segment of Harris voters that doesn’t count.
“I’m sitting here looking at the Trump signs,” Conlin said by phone while taking a break from research in a more Republican part of his district. “But having said that, there are a lot of Democrats who aren’t comfortable giving their signs for Harris. …I have a lot of Republicans who are ‘Never Trumpers.'”
Some Republicans, especially those in swing areas of the state like suburban Grand Rapids, know this all too well.
Republican Paul Hudson, who is running to unseat Democratic-Republican Hillary Scholte in a competitive west Michigan district, said he was “too superstitious to make predictions” and stopped short of pledging to support Trump.
“You can’t turn on your TV without being bombarded with political ads from top to bottom of the ticket,” Hudson said. “This is the center of the political universe in Michigan.”
Alex Seitz-Wald reported from Camden, Maine and Henry Gomez from Detroit.