After months of waiting, Governor Gretchen Whitmer is setting a timeline to fill Michigan’s vacant 35th state Senate District seat.
A special primary election will take place next year on February 3. A special election will follow a couple of months later, on May 5.
The 35th Senate District represents roughly 270,000 residents across Bay, Midland, and Saginaw Counties. It’s been vacant since U.S. Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet resigned in January to join Congress.
"We have a lot of good work to get done before the end of next year. Michiganders want us to create jobs and grow the economy, invest in schools and boost literacy rates, and, of course, fix those damn roads. I look forward to working with the next state senator from this district to tackle these issues and more,” Whitmer said Friday in a press release to announce the special election.
The election date sets up a fight for control of the Michigan Senate, which Democrats currently hold through a 19-18 majority.
A Republican victory would not only tie the Senate, but give Republican lawmakers a chance to kill any legislation by withholding a single vote. That’s because, though Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist is there to break ties, bills that don’t tie die without a full 20 votes.
The open seat is generally considered competitive, despite a Democratic-leaning slant.
Michigan Republican Party Chair Jim Runestad accuses Whitmer of taking that into consideration by delaying the election.
“She's terrified because she believes there’s a very good chance Republicans will win that election and thus will stop her monopoly in the Senate,” Runestad said.
On the Republican side, state Reps. Timmy Beson (R-Bay City), and Bill G. Schuette (R-Midland) are among the names floated to run.
Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel Jr. said he’s not worried about Democrats’ odds next year.
“The Republicans just passed the worst budget in history. We have cuts to health care and the things that matter to families. That’s an opportunity for us to go door to door in that community and have that conversation. It’s the same work we’re doing all across the state. The stakes are a little higher but I’m excited about it,” Hertel said in a possible reference to a recent vote on a Republican-led budget proposal in the Michigan House.
State school board president Pamela Pugh and state Representative Amos O’Neal (D-Saginaw) are among Democrats with either stated or rumored interest in the race.
The decision to wait months to call a special election has drawn criticism from all sides of the political spectrum, who argued residents of the 35th district were being disenfranchised by not having a voice in the state Senate for most of the year. A group of residents sued the governor earlier this month in an attempt to speed up the process.
This week, Whitmer’s lawyers argued the court’s couldn’t require her to act any faster than her own timeline.
On Friday, an attorney representing the plaintiffs in that lawsuit released a statement saying the lawsuit pushed Whitmer’s hand.
“For months, Lansing ignored the problem. Our lawsuit made it impossible to ignore any longer. Today’s election call is proof that the law, when pushed forward with persistence and courage, works,” attorney Phillip L. Ellison said in the press release.
The state constitution doesn’t set a timeline for calling a special election after a vacancy. To that note, past governors have also taken their time.
For example, Detroit went largely unrepresented in Congress between December 2017 and August 2018, when Republican Governor Rick Snyder held a special election to fill serve out the remainder of former U.S. Rep. John Conyers Jr.’s term.
Whomever wins the 35th District will serve out the rest of the current legislative term ending at the end of next year.
