Legendary Motown singer Martha Reeves has seen her share of battles. That includes disagreements with her original back-up singers, the Vandellas, a stint on the Detroit City Council and recent criticism of her rendition of the national anthem.

Yet at age 85, Reeves says she still has fight left in her. And music.

She’s showcasing both on her first new record in two decades, called “Searching.”

Reeves says from her first days in Motown’s Artists and Repertoire, or “A&R” department, she’s tried to deliver tunes that pack a message.

Interview edited for length and clarity.

Martha Reeves: I did a “Heat Wave,” I’ve “Danced in the Street,” I’ve had “Nowhere to Run,” I’ve been in “Quicksand.” What else do I need to do?

Quinn Klinefelter, WDET News: Then why are you doing another record?

MR: I record ’cause I can. My manager, Chris Rowe, kinda helped me get back on the good foot, I’ll put it that way. To do a recording that everybody can learn to love, like Stevie Wonder’s “To Know You is to Love You” (The first single released from “Searching.) We chose that on purpose because I have a personal history with Stevie Wonder.

I was kind of appointed his day care nurse at Motown. When he first came to the studio, he was brought to the A&R department with no introduction or anything. He just was there. I looked and saw a young man, about 8 years old. I said, “Hi, how you doing? What’s your name?” He said, “Stevie. What’s yours?” I said, “Martha.” He said, “You sound like a nice person. Let me see what you look like.” And he fingered my face, precious fingers all over my face.

We got to know each other and fell in love at that moment. He took the liberty of playing rhythms on the typewriter, the telephone. I think he played “Baby I Need Your Lovin’” on the telephone.

We had a good time until they came and knocked on the door and said, “Stevie, you’re needed in Studio A.” It was just across the  hall. So I followed him. We had gotten acquainted and I felt like I was a part of him and he was a part of me, being A&R director.

He went to every instrument in that room and played it. Played a bit of drums, a bit of keyboard, piano, xylophone, harmonica, congas, bongas. He played everything. And (Motown founder) Berry Gordy was standing on the side watching carefully, observing this new talent that Ronnie White of the Miracles had brought to him from church. And after hearing him play all those instruments Berry said, “This kid is a wonder.” There’s his name. Went from Stevland Judkins to Stevie Wonder.

And to sing Stevie Wonder’s “To Know You is to Love You,” a duet between him and his wife, Syreeta, it’s gonna hold a special place in my heart. And I’m sure that Stevie will appreciate it too. To know you is to love you. He’s talking about, maybe, his loved one. I’m talking about God. To know God is to love Him.

QK: It always sounds like you had to really fight your way onto the Motown label, from being a receptionist to them actually recognizing you as an artist?

MR: I was an artist first. I was invited to come to the A&R department for an audition. But when I got there, there was a job. I was asked to answer the phone, by the same guy that approached me and asked me to come to Hitsville, USA (Motown’s original headquarters.) He’d be right back. I didn’t know him that well. But he had given me a card saying, “You have talent. Come to Hitsville.” I was discovered.

On that card was the name Barrett Strong, who sang “Money (That’s What I Want,) one of the first songs my dad liked from Motown. He worked for the city water department, so he was very aware of what was going on in the city. And “Money” was one of his favorite songs. Here I am in the office and I’m talking to the people who produced the song that my dad had taken favor to. And my brother, Benny Reeves, had sang at Hitsville with the Contours. So I was coerced or invited or drawn to or whatever you want to call it on purpose at Motown records. I was asked to come back the next day, the next day, the next day, and it became a habit. Every day, nine o’clock, I’d be at Hitsville, USA. Official secretary, but not really. An artist waiting on my turn. I was invited and I stayed.

QK: There’s so many experiences everybody I’ve ever talked to that’s been connected to Motown has had. And so many classics that you recorded, “Dancing in the Street,” all the rest of them. This is a horrid question journalists often ask, but when you look back at that, are there any moments or songs that have always stood out to you from that time?

MR: Every one. Mom showed me something very young in my life while singing gospel songs in my grandfather’s church. Never sing a song unless you can feel it in your spirit, in your soul. If it can mean something to you, then it’ll be real. If it don’t mean anything to you, it’s just an act of recording. But every song that I sing means something to me, I have it in my heart. Know what I’m talking about, and then give it my worship, give it my praise. And that works for me.

QK: The same way now with this new one, “Searching?”

MR: Yeah. I’m on another level now. I can imitate all my teachers. My album has been classified as jazz but it’s gospel. It’s rock, but it’s pop. It’s rap, but it’s disco. It’s rock and roll, but it’s the blues. We’ve got everything. Somehow we’ve mixed together an album that’s featuring every genre of music, every mode, every mood. So I’m having a good time.

QK: We were talking about Motown. One of the songs on this album is an old Motown song, “I Got it Bad,” that you had cut back in the 1960’s but never released.

MR: It was put on a compilation album that Motown released long after it was recorded, three discs of unreleased product. That shows you have stocked up hit after hit after hit. Some of them have been released, some of them are yet to be. But I worked really hard in the A&R department and I recorded more songs than other artists at Hitsville, USA.

QK: And the one that’s on “Searching,” did you guys remake it completely or did you just take the old recording and kind of gussy it up a bit?

MR: Everything is brand new with brand new musicians, the best to be had from all over the world. I got a chance to be a co-writer on some of the songs. I’ve written on every album I ever recorded. But I’ve never gotten credit. Somehow now I feel I’ve arrived as an artist. I was asked my opinion and was allowed the chance to write on some of the material was already presented to me.

QK: It sounds like there is very much a “praise God” theme, vibe, throughout the entire record.

MR: Yes. I’m dedicated. I’ve got no choice for the rest of my life. I’m reborn. I’m saved by grace. I’m a messenger. I know my job.

One of the questions to me has been, “What made me go back in the studio?” I’ve never been out. I’ve been recording all these years. Most artists are recording all their lives. Everything doesn’t make it to the public or get released. But artists have to stay active, they have to stay in the mode of. I have to sing every day.

QK: People will speak about the civil rights movement and they’ll bring up “Dancing in the Street” and tie it sometimes to the riot, the rebellion in Detroit in 1967. They’ll say some of them thought it was a call to riot, like an anthem of sorts. Was there even any truth to that?

MR: There’s no truth whatsoever. The sweet Marvin Gaye wrote the song. I happened to be standing in the studio at this window that you could see him sing. And I was able to roam around the studio because I worked in the A&R department. So I stood there and watched Marvin, which was one of my favorite pastimes. He was so fine, I gotta be real with you. I was watching him sing “Dancing in the Street” and he did a wonderful job. He saw me in the window and beckoned to me, “Come here, Martha, come here.”

When I went in he said, “I want you to sing this song for me.” And in my mind I thought, I don’t wanna be in the street. I wanna be in the studio, I wanna be in the house, I wanna be in the theater, I wanna be at the casino, I wanna be somewhere, I don’t wanna be in the street.

I didn’t know it was gonna be the hit that it was. It took me the first take to realize that the tape machine wasn’t turned on. They didn’t think I was ready to record it. The engineer, Lawrence Horn, said, “Hey man, the machine wasn’t on.” So I wanted to be angry about it, but I expressed it in my delivery of “Dancing in the Street,” if anybody listens to it and hears how excited I was.

Marvin recorded it to keep people from fighting and breaking into people’s businesses and throwing bricks and acting the fool. He thought if everybody started dancing to that beautiful music that he wrote, it would quench that riot and everything would be wonderful. Those were our intentions. However wrong they were taken is another thing altogether.

QK: You were actually onstage at the Fox Theater when the riot started happening and you had to kind of mellow the crowd out as things were going on?

MR: Yeah, they sent me out there. Said, “Come here Martha.” I thought something was wrong, my dress had unzipped or my shoes weren’t tied or something. And they said, “You gotta go on stage and tell everybody that the riot is on, there are tanks in the street, it’s an uproar. You gotta get these kids out of your dressing room and out of this theater and get to their home. There’s a curfew. There’s a siren going on. Can you hear it? Go to the stage and tell everybody they’ve got to leave quietly. Don’t run, ’cause if you panic the audience, somebody might get stampeded.” He said all this to me and pushed me out on stage.

And I went to the mic and somehow God gave me the ad lib to say, “Everybody, there’s been a riot, you’ve got to go home. Leave quietly.” It worked. Everybody just calmly walked out, with be barely any sound whatsoever. It was scary. Nobody hollered out, “What do you mean?” None of that. Everybody just got up and walked out. Half of them ran, of course, because you could hear the sirens. It was a horrible time.

QK: When people get to a point where they’ve really done a lot in their career and have all this vast experience, some will ask what would be your advice for the next generation, to any young artists coming up? Especially nowadays compared to Hitsville, when everything is digital, it’s streaming, people can share files, and is an artist even gonna earn anything from their work? And you don’t have the big A&R departments spending zillions to develop you as an act. What advice would you have for people coming up in this age?

MR: I don’t know. Nobody advised me. I just went into it head first and took my chances and took what fate had for me. I’ve always tried to be righteous, I’ve always tried to be honest, and always tried to put my best foot forward. I’ve had lessons and I used them. I study other singers, singers that went before me. I imitate them in some of my moves when I sing.

On this new album, I was allowed to do whatever I felt like doing, whatever I heard in the lyrics, however I wanted to express them. I haven’t had that kind of freedom in my past recordings. I’ve almost been dictated to by the person that actually wrote the song. This time I was allowed to not only add to the lyrics of the songs already written, but to bring songs that I’ve written solely on my own. It makes me feel like not only an artist but a writer too, and a producer as well. I’d like to produce some other talent, younger talent, teach them what I’ve learned.

Everything that I’ve ever done, somebody came and got me and made me do it. Or didn’t make me, but asked me if I could. And I was willing and able. Everything in show business.

My first song was “Jesus Met the Woman at the Well” with my two older brothers at my grandfather’s church. I was three years old, but we won that candy! I still remember the words. So, since the age of three I’ve known that I got a message and God will use me. Because I can. He can’t use everybody, because everybody’s not willing. I’m a willing spirit.

Jerome Vaughn will tell you it all started with a Panasonic ball-and-chain radio gifted to him by his mother. He was hooked on the voices and foley art that created clear pictures in his mind, all through sound alone.

 ”I was one of those kids who slept with a radio on my nightstand. And even now, I’m one of those people, if I’m driving around late at night, I’m flipping around on the AM radio to see what station I can get from how far away.”

Now, Jerome looks back on a celebrated career in radio news on the brink of retirement. He’s spent 34 years at WDET, where he got to tell the real stories of his hometown. During his time at the station, he’s been an intern, an underwriter, a producer, a reporter, senior news editor, assistant news director…

And he’s spent over 20 years as WDET’s news director.

“WDET is really a special place,” said Jerome. “And Detroit is my favorite place on the face of the Earth.”

Detroit born and raised, Jerome has always held his hometown close. He recalls how media once depicted only the worst of Detroit—sometimes fabricating things altogether to push the narrative of it being a dangerous place, beyond redemption. He worked to set the record straight.

While he covered insightful stories about the metro Detroit region, he worked to make sure that people of color had a voice in news. As a part of that mission, he founded WDET’s Detroit Evening Report Program that tells news for and by people of color.

His dedication to ethical, accurate reporting has earned him many recognitions over the years, including awards from the Michigan Association of Broadcasters, Michigan Associated Press, and Society of Professional Journalists. In 2018, he was inducted into the Michigan Journalism Hall of Fame.

Jerome is also a passionate mentor for WDET interns and beyond. He’s helped kickstart many careers in broadcast, and is always ready to help more young journalists build the skills and networks needed to enter the field.

“I knew that I wasn’t gonna be here, working at WDET in my 90s. I want to make sure that there’s quality public radio being created, you know, so that I can enjoy it after I’ve retired,” Jerome said with a wry smile.

“Jerome’s impact on WDET is deep and lasting. Futhermore, the whole Detroit journalism industry owes a lot to this man, who lives and breathes news. WDET will do its best to continue along the path Jerome helped set while missing his wisdom and humor,” said General Manager Mary Zatina.

Jerome’s final broadcast on WDET will be Monday, Aug. 17 for All Things Considered – Detroit, from 3-7 p.m.

A lasting legacy

At a retirement celebration on Aug. 14, Jerome was surprised with the creation of a permanent internship in his name, honoring his decades of mentorship and the many WDET interns he has helped launch into their careers. The Jerome Vaughn Internship was made possible through gifts from generous WDET donors and members of the newsroom.

Your voice helps shape WDET.

Whether you tune in for local news, music, culture or conversation, we want to hear from you. Our annual Listener Survey is now open, and your feedback will help guide the future of WDET.

As a listener-supported public radio station, we’re accountable to our community. Your responses help us understand what’s working, what you’d like to hear more of, and where we can do better.

The survey takes just a few minutes to complete, is completely anonymous, and will be open until the end of August. Thank you for helping us build a stronger WDET for everyone.

Fill out the survey »

Come November, thousands of political seats are up for grabs.

One of the most compelling races in Michigan is the Senate. That’s in part because of what it says about the Democratic Party, especially after Mallory McMorrow dropped out.

Most polls have Abdul El-Sayed leading in the race, but there is still uncertainty as to whether he can defeat Haley Stevens, a sitting congresswoman who gained notoriety for her moderation, and for bailing out the auto industry.

Dennis Darnoi is the founder of Densar Consulting, based in Farmington. He says many voters want candidates that have an anti-institutional and populist bent.

“Progressive candidates are running against these establishment candidates and they’re being more successful because the Democratic base is really looking for two things: They’re looking for people who are going to fight and they’re looking for people who are anti-system.”

Darnoi spoke with The Metro’s Robyn Vincent about the Senate race and how it reflects changes to politics in Michigan and beyond.

Hear the full conversation using the media player above.

Listen to The Metro weekdays from 10 a.m. to noon ET on 101.9 FM and stream on-demand.

Never miss an episode — subscribe to The Metro on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, NPR, or wherever you get your podcasts.

More stories from The Metro

I’m seeing more examples of indie bands (whatever that means today) finding their way to an audience by presenting a solid cover. Australian group Royel Otis is one that stands out, with their solid, true-to-form cover of the Cranberries’ “Linger.”

Chicago indie rockers Friko are another example, first arriving to my ears via their forceful cover of Radiohead’s “Weird Fishes,” which, admittedly, is a ballsy one to cover (but they nailed it).

It got me hooked enough that I started digging into the brand new sophomore album, “Something Worth Waiting For,” and have completely fallen in love with the title track.

It starts out like a blurry vision; like an acoustic guitar and a distant voice are just barely making their way out of a dusty vinyl groove off in the distance, before blossoming into this massive anthemic swell of waiting for the good thing even though you might not measure up yourself.

“So I’m waiting for something more
Something worth waiting for
I wanna see you and me
Waking up, glad to be
So I’m waiting for something more
Something worth waiting for”

This is exactly what you love to see from an artist on their sophomore release. More space, bigger sound, the growth they always dreamed up after praying that anyone would even care about the debut in the first place. Luckily for Friko, they’re continuing to carve out a space for themselves and their new stadium-ready sound.

For anyone looking to check them out in Detroit, they’ll be playing at The Loving Touch on Oct. 17.

This story was originally published by Midbrow.

President Trump is visiting Beijing to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping this week. Michigan lawmakers are warning him against agreeing to any deals that would allow Chinese electric vehicles into the U.S.

While they are not currently available in the states, President Trump suggested he may be open to allowing them during a visit to the Detroit Economic Club earlier this year. The EVs have become popular, low-cost sellers in Europe and are now available in Canada and Mexico.

Legislation has been introduced in Washington to ban sale of the vehicles. That includes a bill co-sponsored by Democratic Michigan Senator Elissa Slotkin and Ohio Republican Bernie Moreno.

Slotkin argues that having those models on U.S. roads driving near military bases and civilian infrastructure could be a security risk.

“Taking all that data, all that video, all that mapping and sending that back,” says Slotkin. “As someone who’s from the Pentagon, that is the exact detailed information an adversarial nation loves to have in their war planning.”

While Slotkin acknowledges that major tech companies, such as Google, are already collecting people’s data, she argues those companies must follow U.S. laws when handling that information.

Another concern is the impact it could have on American manufacturers, who would stand to lose out on sales.

Republican John Moolenaar represents Michigan’s 2nd Congressional District. He warns that one of the factors keeping Chinese vehicle prices down are unethical labor practices in the country.

“Chinese companies use slave labor to undercut the fair wages of hard-working Americans,” says Moolenaar.

Lawmakers say the U.S. can’t compete with the way the Chinese government subsidizes their auto industry. They argue that creates artificially low pricing for Chinese products that  American companies can’t compete with.

University of Michigan Professor Derek Peterson wanted to highlight the work of school activists – both past and present – in his commencement speech over the weekend.

What he got was controversy.

Peterson discussed the work of suffragette Sarah Burger Stearns, the woman who worked for years to get the University of Michigan to admit women to the school. He talked about the Black Action Movement of the 1970s and ’80s that sought to make campus life better for people of color. Peterson championed Moritz Levi, the first Jewish professor at U of M.

However, it was a short clip of Peterson praising the work of campus pro-Palestinian protesters that drew the ire of conservatives, pro-Israel activists, and school leadership.

Elyssa Schmier of the Michigan Anti-Defamation League called it “inappropriate, divisive, and deeply unfair” to Jewish students.

Interim U of M President Domenico Grasso apologized for the speech, calling it “hurtful and insensitive.”

In response, the University removed the YouTube video of the entire commencement.

For his part, Peterson is unfazed.

He’s a tenured history and African studies professor and has been with the university since 2009. He’s a former MacArthur “genius grant” recipient and the outgoing chair of the Faculty Senate.

He tells WDET’s Russ McNamara that he’s surprised by the controversy – especially after his remarks were approved by the U of M leadership.

Derek Peterson: I thought I was giving a speech that was meant to congratulate all these students on the success of their time at Michigan. And I wanted to honor student activists. We had these two consequential athletes on the rostrum sitting beside me, Michael Phelps and Jalen Rose, both of whom I greatly admire. And I wanted to give equal time to student activists who I think have done more than most to push our university along the path toward social justice. So the goal of the address was not to provoke or cause controversy. It was to expand the kinds of things that we honored at our commencement ceremony and to bring into view how much I myself have learned and benefited from the work that generations of activists have done here in Ann Arbor.

Russ McNamara: It seems like – recently – there’s been a measure of work done by some to minimize activism at the University of Michigan.

DP: Faculty Senate leaders don’t often get an audience with the regents and with opinion leaders across the state as much as one does at commencement. And we’ve been trying for the past year, and past two years, in fact, to make an argument about how Michigan’s acquiescence to federal authorities around student protests has damaged our collective culture.

The space for protest on campus this past couple years has been dramatically constrained. The administration has instrumentalized the Student Conduct Code and made it much more difficult to organize protests.

Meanwhile, federal authorities have gone after international students and made the cost of protesting, regardless of what kind of person you are, much higher, specifically, if you speak on behalf of Palestinians.

So I’m a tenured professor. I’ve got all these titles after my name, and I felt it was a good occasion to honor the work that activists have done, and to bring it into view in a place in which it was increasingly difficult to see how much activists have contributed to our collective life.

RM: Is it surprising to you that when someone like Regent Sarah Hubbard says commencement is not the time or place for political messages? Because I read that and I’m kind of surprised that someone who graduated from the University of Michigan would not feel that at any point, there couldn’t be a political message attached to the university or in that city.

DP: Yeah, I don’t know if she’s ever really spent time with Michigan students. The idea that graduation ceremonies should be apolitical, nostalgic, that sort of thing, is just bunk.

The University of Michigan is not a finishing school for polite men and women, and our students are not freaking wilting flowers. They’ve just finished their degrees at the foremost public university in the United States. They can freaking well-handle controversy. They don’t need to have sentiment and nostalgia slathered upon them.

What they need is a spine stiffening. They need encouragement to face injustice and inequity with the tools that we’ve given them here at the U of M. It’s take what you’ve learned at this public institution and go and serve the public to which we are beholden as the world’s leading public university. So I fundamentally disagree with the idea that graduations should be, you know, romantic and uncontroversial. That’s a betrayal of the purposes of public education.

RM: You wrote a book that came out last year, A Popular History of Idi Amin’s Uganda. In this moment, are there lessons that can be learned about the United States, about world politics from Idi Amin’s Uganda?

DP: The book, which I wrote over the course of something like 20 years, is grounded on a lot of research that I did with archives that had been deliberately suppressed or lost or forgotten over the course of generations after Amin fell from power in 1979.

As a scholar, much of my work is about how through industrious historical research, we can uncover lessons and materials and ideas that have been either forgotten or suppressed by people in power. So as a scholar of African history looking at events in 2026 in Ann Arbor and around the United States, where it’s increasingly difficult to say anything at all about what happened in Gaza, I can’t play along with that deliberate silencing of an act of great violence.

And let me say I’m full of sympathy for Jewish people who suffered, including students at U of M who suffered as a result of the awful actions of Hamas on the seventh of October 2023.

I don’t have any sympathy for Hamas sympathizers, but as the leader of the Faculty Senate and as a faculty member who studies colonial and post-colonial African history it’s really important that we don’t invisibilize Palestinian suffering, particularly in a state in which many of our students come from the Middle East and have relations who have died in the course of Israel’s war in Gaza.

So honoring their experience at commencement seemed to me to be as vital as it was, also as I did to honor the experience of Jewish students who have found a safe haven in Ann Arbor over the course of generations.

I’m troubled by the fact that this speech has been portrayed as being antisemitic. It’s not. It was not. And I don’t feel the need to apologize for the speech, as I’ve been asked to do by people in administration here at U of M.

I do regret that Jewish attendees might have found themselves on the back foot, troubled by the remarks. I didn’t have the purpose going into it of provoking unhappiness on a happy day. And if I did it over again, I probably would add a sentence to the end of my speech. I would have phrased it something like ‘sing for Jewish students at the university who, over the past two years, have kept the memory of their loved ones who died on the seventh of October alive and have brought their suffering into view here at the university as well.’

I can honor the violence and trauma and be appalled by the awfulness of the seventh of October 2023 and also be vigorously pro-Palestinian and appalled also at the violence of Israel’s war in Gaza. I think both things are possible.

There’s no doubt the Detroit Lions have scarred many of their fans, being the first team to ever go 0-16.

Heartbreaking losses that seemed to defy the rule book, like Calvin Johnson’s non-catch in Chicago. Or the picked up penalty in the playoffs vs the Cowboys.

Losing affects the players too, like Hall of Fame running back Barry Sanders faxing his retirement to his hometown newspaper.

It’s not easy for anyone around that franchise, apparently. The same goes for Dearborn-raised, Brooklyn-based comedian Joel Walkowski.

In his book “Honolulu Blues: How Loving a Losing Team Created a Winning Man” Walkowski recounts the story of his family’s personal trauma, alongside the failings of his favorite team, the Detroit Lions. It’s incredibly funny and deeply personal in a way that many can relate to.

Walkowski has been on stages across the country. His writing has appeared in the New York Times, on Comedy Central and a bunch of other places. He tells WDET’s Russ McNamara why he decided to write the book.

Joel Walkowski: It was during the [Lions coach Matt] Patricia era, and you knew that fourth quarter collapse was always coming, and knowing that the hard thing was coming kind of made it easier. And that made me think, like, ‘oh, being a Lions fan impacted me in a profound way’.

And then as part of my, like, sobriety journey, I was tasked to do goals for myself. Like, what do I really want out of life? What do I think maximizes who I am? And it was like, “Oh, if I don’t write this book, I will always regret it.” So it became my purpose, my number one goal, and like I revolved my life around writing this book.

Russ McNamara: It says a lot about the depth of a book when a historically bad franchise with its own share of tragedy isn’t the darkest stuff in it.

JW: I’ll say that there is maybe every bit of darkness that could exist is in this book, but it’s handled with lightness. And I do think the overlap is there because I started to get very serious about my sobriety, September 2021 exactly.

And I don’t know how familiar you guys are with Lions history, but things started to be done very different. So it’s Campbell-Holmes era. It’s Sheila Ford. I’m bouncing back from, like, my darkest points. So like looking at Jared [Goff] and Dan [Campbell] and Brad [Holmes], as I’m like, you know, white knuckling 90 days of sobriety and thinking, like, “Oh, is there a different way to do this?” It was so helpful.

RM: In the book, you’re very open about your experience growing up, and you specifically mentioned essentially getting addicted to speed as a child—as many people of our age did. At what point did you, even as a child, kind of realize something’s not right?

JW: I was seven years old when I was put on very high doses of Adderall. Then I get to high school and there was a high school video program. I started to want to make different videos. I wanted to have more ambitions, but I would just start taking pill after pill after pill, pulling all-nighters and really string myself out.

But along those same lines, every time I’d produce something, I got validation. I was seen for the first time. So this finding of my identity was happening while I was abusing a substance.

I didn’t become an addict because I was letting loose or partying. I became an addict alone in my room, fostering some ambition, because putting something out there was the only way I had any value, any worth, right?

RM: How much of that value and worth did you sort of get tied into with following the ins and outs of the Detroit Lions?

JW: My life revolves around Sundays, but I try and make them only value added. Regardless of a win or loss, I play basketball from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. If we win, I show my girlfriends the highlights. If we lose, I turn off my phone and don’t check any football news until Tuesday.

If you get to the very ending of this book, which dovetails with, you know, a certain 17-point halftime lead, [Lions vs 49ers in 2023 NFC Championship Game] that lesson was given to me is “the win is the friends and relationships we make along the way.” And that it took me nearly 40 years to learn that.

Joel Walkowski’s book “Honolulu Blues: How Loving a Losing Team Created a Winning Man” is out July 14, 2026 just in time for the start of Detroit Lions training camp. It is available for pre-order now.

The progressive wing of the Michigan Democratic Party made its voice heard over the weekend during the party’s endorsement convention.

Democrats gathered in Huntington Place in Detroit Sunday to endorse party candidates for some statewide offices, like attorney general and secretary of state. Party leadership said the convention hit record numbers, and nearly every candidate backed by the party’s progressive wing won their endorsement races.

Campaigns brought drums, photo backdrops, and people in orange jumpsuits and sunglasses to carry billboards, all to stand out from the field.

But the delegates seemed to care most about substance and the issues. Often, those issues involved progressive themes like limiting corporate and outside political spending, providing universal healthcare, and ending U.S. involvement in foreign wars.

Many delegates, like Dearborn Public Schools Board member Adel Mozip, wanted candidates who inspire them.

“We’re looking forward to electing people who are going to be working for the people and not paid for by corporations and interests groups,” Mozip said outside a meeting of the Michigan Democratic Party’s Yemeni Caucus Sunday.

Campaign spending

Around the convention, canvassers gathered petition signatures for a ban on some corporate political spending. Candidates bragged about not taking money from corporate political action committees while speaking to the main crowd and in smaller meetings.

Still, attendees worried party leadership hadn’t gotten the message.

Jessie Hishon and Susan Sylvester, first-time delegates from metro Detroit who attended the party’s Progressive Caucus meeting — which spilled out of a crowded room — said they felt the party didn’t trust progressive candidates enough to win against Republicans.

“I think there are too many people who don’t believe that it can happen,” Hishon said.

Sylvester said her top issue was the influence of outside spending on Michigan campaigns.

“All of the issues are important to me but we have to take the money out of politics so we can have representation in our so-called democracy,” Sylvester said.

Who takes the blame?

Democrats lost in 2024 because of splits within their traditional coalition of moderates, progressives, and racial and ethnic minorities. With Michigan possibly deciding control of Congress this November, party leaders want to change that story.

A few 2028 presidential maybes spoke at a pre-convention event on Saturday, including former Vice President Kamala Harris, Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear, and New Jersey Senator Corey Booker. He warned Democrats that not voting is what let President Donald Trump retake the White House.

“You let somebody get in office who is locking up our children. You let somebody in office who is taking away our healthcare. You let somebody in office who’s taking away workers’ rights. You let somebody in office who got rid of the Department of Education,” Booker said to a cheering crowd at the Women’s Caucus luncheon.

At the convention, some delegates echoed calls for unity and engagement, even though that often requires listening to dissenters.

Detroiter Michelle Broughton said she’s been coming to Democratic Party conventions for over four decades.

“Our message needs to come across to all of us, whether we’re a young Dem or an old Dem,” Broughton said. “They need to talk about tabletop issues: food, gas, education, affordability, housing.”

But old battle lines remained visible on the convention floor.

Tensions over Palestine-Israel conflict

Progressive U.S. Senate candidate Dr. Abdul El-Sayed received massive applause during his speech that criticized outside spending in Michigan races from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC. Congresswoman Haley Stevens (D-MI 11), who is running against El-Sayed on a more traditional Democratic platform of affordability and re-shoring American manufacturing, followed and received boos.

In the University of Michigan regents race, incumbent Jordan Acker lost his reelection bid. Acker had faced criticism for his handling of pro-Palestine student protests — a fault line that’s grown increasingly fraught for Democrats in recent years. Amir Makled, a lawyer who represented one of those protestors, beat him.

During parts of the program, some attendees said they noticed some fellow delegates causing a disruption when a proposed resolution in support of Palestinians wasn’t taken up. Videos of the crowd appear to show a handful of convention members yelling at presenters.

Kalamazoo delegates Michelle Zukowski-Serlin and her husband Troy said they felt the jeering and booing of candidates crossed a line.

Both attended the party’s Jewish Caucus meeting. They said delegates at that meeting showed more respect to candidates that opposed support for Israel than supporters of those opponents showed pro-Israel candidates on stage.

“This is a bigger issue and that is mutual respect and acting with diplomacy, I would never boo one of their candidates,” Michelle Zukowski-Serlin said.

Could a primary fix the problems?

While many agreed the Democrats should learn from 2024, not everyone agreed on the lesson. Some want a wholesale change to how the party chooses nominees for statewide office, calling for a switch from party conventions to primary elections.

Oakland University political science professor David Dulio said Michigan is a rarity: most other states do use primaries for those down-ballot races — but there is no cure-all for messy nomination fights.

“I think there’s a temptation to think the grass is always greener and that isn’t always the case,” Dulio said.

States started moving toward primaries in the early 20th century to take power away from party insiders and test candidates’ ability to win elections, Dulio said.

“That has become the dominant form of candidate selection from within a political party, but that doesn’t mean the other options aren’t legitimate or that they can’t work,” said Dulio.

Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel said he believes a primary would be better because it would be open to all voters who choose a Democratic Party ballot.

Making that change would require voters to approve a constitutional amendment.

Michigan Republican Party Chair Jim Runestad said there’s little interest in the idea on his side of the aisle, arguing that convention nominations are less susceptible than primaries to big-money spending by outside interest groups.

Progressive surge

For some convention attendees, the lesson was to work within the current framework: support the Democratic nominees that they mostly agree with, even if the nominee is not their top choice. For others, it was that party leadership needs to get behind candidates who inspire, so voters want to support their nominee.

University of Michigan graduate student Nathan Kim said it’s not enough for the party to choose a “status quo” candidate.

“I think the Michigan Democratic Party and the party in general needs to face consequences. They need to know that they can’t get away with failing over, and over, and over again,” Kim said.

Likewise, Katarina Keating, another Michigan graduate student, said some candidates just aren’t worth supporting, even against Republicans.

“You need to draw the line somewhere. Right? If you’re going to vote for anybody if they’re in the right party, no matter what they’ve done or what they’ve said, what are you doing, what are you really voting for, what are you really trying to change?” Keating said.

At the end of the day, nearly every progressive-backed candidate won a party endorsement.

Both the upcoming August primary election, in which the U.S. Senate race remains close, and the November general election could show whether that support extends broadly outside of the convention walls — or if it’s a sign of progressive strength, just within the party’s base.

Originally posted by Michigan Public Radio.

WDET is starting a new series of Crossing the Lines reports Monday centering Highland Park.  The small city of about 8,500 residents has made a good deal of U.S. history through the decades.  It’s also seen hard financial times in recent years.  

WDET journalists have been out in the community for weeks—and will be out there for several more—talking to residents about what they want the rest of metro Detroit to know about their city.

WDET news director Jerome Vaughn is leading Crossing The Lines – Highland Park.  He says he decided to examine the city more deeply because of its central location.

“It’s a place a lot of people in metro Detroit travel through each and every day, but the majority don’t stop in Highland Park to shop or to get a bite to eat.”

Vaughn started researching the city, looking at census records, Highland Park history, and businesses, before heading out to tour the city over a number of weeks.

WDET will air stories on Highland Park through mid-May.  If there’s something about the city you think we should know, drop us a line at news@wdet.org.