GOP Pours Money Into Michigan, One Of Its Only Chances To Oust A Democratic Senator
Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.) can’t fully explain why there are so many undecided voters left in his state two weeks ahead of one of the highest stakes elections in a generation.
“That’s hard for me to answer,” Peters said in a quick phone call Sunday after a campaign stop in Waterford, Michigan, noting it’s not unusual for voters to tune in to an election late, let alone in a pandemic. “Michigan is a complicated place.”
According to a Detroit Free Press and EPIC-MRA poll in mid-October, Peters led by 6 percentage points over opponent John James, one of Republicans’ strongest recruits in the 2020 election cycle. But that survey had a larger-than-expected chunk of undecided voters: 11% of the total surveyed electorate and, notably, 18% of Black voters. This week, a Fox News poll found just 5% of likely voters were still undecided.
Poll after poll shows James, a young Black conservative entrepreneur and Iraq War veteran, within single digits of Peters, a first-term senator who is perhaps most known for being unknown. The matchup is one of the GOP’s few chances to oust an incumbent Democratic senator, and the result could hinge on that slice of undecided voters.
The numbers are keeping Peters’ campaign on its toes going into the final stretch of the election season. In 2016, Hillary Clinton fell short in Democratic strongholds like Detroit and Flint, particularly among Black voters — a dip in turnout that helped Donald Trump narrowly win the state by less than 11,000 votes.
State campaign finance watchers estimate the price tag of the race could be more than $100 million by Election Day.
This week, Barack Obama, whom Joe Biden’s presidential campaign is primarily deploying to Pennsylvania to encourage voter turnout among Black men, cut an ad for Peters, highlighting his work on passing the auto bailout, protecting health insurance coverage for those with preexisting conditions and securing more funding for Great Lakes restoration....
