In Michigan, we have many needs: higher-paying jobs, better educational outcomes, and more public transit. Above all, we need more people. 

A lot is at stake. Even if your neighborhood feels bustling, when Michigan’s population stops growing, the state actually shrinks in all the ways that matter. Since 1970, we’ve lost a seat in Congress after every census, and those same population counts decide how hundreds of billions in federal funding are divided. That means less money for roads, water systems, housing, and more. As baby boomers retire, our workforce is shrinking, and Michigan has lost 93,000 workers just since last spring. Fewer people here means less political power, fewer resources, and a smaller tax base to pay the bills.

Michigan’s leaders agree — we need to attract more people to our state. Yet one central question remains: how do we make it happen, and who is responsible for leading the way? Some are trying to answer that question. The state of Michigan has a growth office. The City of Detroit has an initiative to grow its population. 

Jeff Donofrio is a leader in the population growth space. He’s the president and chief executive officer of Business Leaders For Michigan. He’s written about this topic in several reports, and he’s worked for the City of Detroit and the State of Michigan to resolve the problem.

He believes we need to reform teaching.“It’s about making sure that [students are] engaged and can do stuff besides passing a standardized test,” says Donofrio.

He joined host Robyn Vincent on The Metro to explore how government culture needs to change to build more housing, create better regional transit, and to ultimately attract more people to the state.

Hear the full conversation using the media player above.

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The United Auto Workers (UAW) endorsed Abdul El-Sayed for Michigan’s open U.S. senate seat and Jocelyn Benson for Governor.  

For UAW Region 1A Director Mark DePaoli, this move puts the union “back at the forefront” in terms of political influence.  

To determine which candidate receives their endorsement, DePaoli said the UAW Community Action Program (CAP) Board schedules meetings with candidates to ask questions and vote on who best reflects their values.  

“They ask a lot of tough questions because they want to be able to hold the candidates accountable for their answers,” DePaoli said.  

UAW rules require a two-thirds majority of CAP board member to agree in order for an endorsement to be made. 

“The best part about it is whether you’re one of the CAP reps from the plant, you’re one of the three Michigan directors, or you’re the president of the UAW, everybody’s vote weighs the same,” DePaoli said.  

Selecting a senate candidate

The CAP representatives came from each plant and facility represented by UAW, DePaoli said, and ended up voting in favor of El-Sayed.

Another way UAW members learn more about the candidates and their beliefs is through a public debate in which the candidates discuss their values.  

“It was live stream for all of our members, and the consensus at the end of that debate amongst everybody that was talking was that Abdul was the clear-cut winner,” DePaoli said. 

The vote was a surprise in some circles since the other two candidates—Congresswoman Haley Stevens and State Senator Mallory McMorrow—both have some background in the auto industry.

Stevens worked on the 2009 auto bailout in the Obama Administration. McMorrow trained as car designer. In autoworker-heavy Michigan, both candidates have leaned into drawing the interest of organized labor.

DePaoli said he was “dreading” the endorsement decision because each candidate had values that the UAW supported, but he decided that El-Sayed would be best suited to tackle the issue of healthcare, which DePaoli  referred to as “the biggest problem” for the majority of Americans.   

“We seem to be the only country where it’s acceptable for big business to make profit off of our illnesses,” DePaoli said. “Why not a health care expert in the U.S. Senate to help try and fix some of these problems?” 

El-Sayed said he was “deeply honored” to receive the endorsement from UAW. El-Sayed makes it a point that his campaign is built from union members instead of “corporate PAC money, AIPAC and Washington insiders.” 

“Together, we’re going to take on corporate greed, rebuild an economy that works for working people, strengthen collective bargaining and ensure that the future of Michigan manufacturing is built right here by union workers,” El-Sayed said.  

In the past, the UAW has almost exclusively endorsed Democratic candidates. According to DePaoli, UAW leadership invited all candidates for the U.S. Senate seat, and only three Democrats attended. Republican Mike Rogers did not attend.

“It makes it hard to endorse somebody that doesn’t even bother to come out and listen to the questions and hear the concerns of your membership, let alone give an answer,” DePaoli said. “I don’t think they even try to get Labor’s endorsement because they know they’re not going to vote any policies in favor of Labor.” 

Why Jocelyn Benson?

In the race for Michigan Governor, Jocelyn Benson has a financial advantage over Genesee County Sheriff Chris Swanson. She also has a lead in the polls.

According to DePaoli both candidates were worthy of backing and recently discussed their positions for the CAP board at UAW Local 600.

“Two great candidates coming from completely different backgrounds,” DePaoli said. “At the end of the day, we don’t completely trust in polls, but we were comfortable that Jocelyn Benson was the correct decision.”

None of the Republican candidates for governor showed up.

At the time, former Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan was in the race and in the forum.

“I think a lot of people were surprised at how well he did,” DePaoli said. “But I think everybody had gotten to a point to say, well, even if we don’t endorse him—if he does win— we’re comfortable that we can work with him and get things done for labor.”

Duggan dropped out citing concerns over money and no path to victory given a recent surge for democrats. 

The Michigan Senate is set to lose three women of color from Detroit-area districts.

Erika Geiss, Stephanie Chang, and Sylvia Santana are all term limited.

Eboni Taylor is running in the 3^rd district – and was recruited to run by Senator Chang.

There are 10 other people in the primary including: Kimberley Hill Knott, Latanya Garrett,  Adam Hollier, John Conyers III, and Korey Hall.

Taylor is also the Vice President of Programs for Higher Heights for America, a political action committee with the goal of increasing Black women’s elected representation. Taylor spoke to WDET’s Russ McNamara about the challenges Black women face in campaigns and where she finds the most support.  

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

Taylor: All federal races, all statewide executive races, according to the state’s constitution, and the only local race that we partake in is top 100 cities for mayor. So, really excited that my organization, with me at the helm of the program and the political work, was very proud that we were able to support our now Mayor Mary Sheffield. 

McNamara: Does Mayor Sheffield endorse your campaign currently? 

Taylor: I think that Mayor Sheffield is currently staying out of it because it is an extremely crowded race. There are 11 people in the race, but I know that she does believe strongly in Black women’s leadership, and Black women stepping up and deciding to run. So, I do know that she holds that value. 

McNamara: What are the challenges that go into getting a woman of color elected? Black women specifically. 

Taylor: Women in general, it takes them four to five times to be asked to run before they say yes. A woman of color, it takes even more times for them to be asked before they decide to run, and when they do say yes, the issues that they face are numerous, but the number one issue is that it’s hard to raise funds. As the Vice President of Programs and the political work at Higher Heights, I’m in conversations with candidates all across the country, all different walks of life, and that is probably the number one thing that rises to the top, is that it’s hard to raise money in comparison to their white counterparts, to their male counterparts. It’s hard to get campaign staff that actually can put forth products and put forth a campaign that’s in their voice, because these are folks who are cookie cutting from campaign to campaign, instead of understanding that a Black woman’s voice and a Black woman’s way of running a campaign might be different, not always, but it might be different, and for us to not have just across the board, campaign managers, finance directors, who don’t understand the importance and the uniqueness of a Black woman or a woman of color running, we need more of that, and so those are probably the top two issues that we’re seeing.  

McNamara: Does that surprise you? Since one of the key pillars of the Democratic base are Black women. 

Taylor: Yeah, and Black women, we have been key to the Democratic party. We have been a very strong voting block. We have been essentially the architects, the purveyors, if you will, of democracy, and for us to not be at the helm, at the vanguard, and the forefront, is a problem. And I think that the Democratic Party, it’s high time for them to step up—and I think that they are—to see the uniqueness that Black women bring and the community and the network that comes with Black women, because we are at the center of our communities, we help support our immediate families. I was just on the doors with a woman who was talking about making sure she got to all of her neighbors on her block, that they got out and voted, or they submitted their absentee ballot, and so this is the work that Black women have been doing to ensure that they can feed their families, to ensure that they can go to work and not worry about being treated unfairly, and that’s the only way that they can do it if they do it themselves. 

You probably learned this as a kid: When something goes wrong, you call 911. Someone answers, and help is on the way. But across America’s biggest cities, more than 1 in 5 911 centers can’t answer calls fast enough to meet the national standard.

Often, there simply aren’t enough people on staff to pick up the phone.

Reporter Byard Duncan spent a year finding out how often emergency calls go unanswered. His reporting was the source of recent episode of the investigative podcast Reveal called “911, Please Hold.” His search took him from California to Capitol Hill, and one common theme emerged: emergency call centers dispatchers are not classified as first responders.

In the federal government’s eyes, they sit alongside receptionists and bill collectors. There’s a move in Congress to change that, and this past winter, a team from Detroit’s 911 center went to Washington to fight for it.

Why aren’t emergency call dispatchers considered first responders? Duncan joined The Metro to share his findings.

“911, Please Hold” was produced by Byard Duncan for Type Investigations in partnership with Reveal.

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

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More stories from The Metro

For the past few years, Michigan Republicans have been fractured between the historically small government variety and the Trump fanatics who lean into conspiracy theories.

State GOP conventions have been a flashpoint for controversy and fighting.

“We have had fisticuffs, kicking in the groin—you name it, all videotaped and spread all over the nation,” said Jim Runestad, Michigan Republican Party Chair.

“When I first went to the RNC, they said ‘you’re the groin kickers’ and I was saying, ‘well, this isn’t really a good reputation for a state party to have,’ particularly when people decide where they’re going to put their donations.”

In an interview at the Mackinac Policy Conference, Runestad—who is also a state senator—tells WDET’s Russ McNamara that he feels like the in-fighting has largely stopped.

The following interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Russ McNamara: What brought about this change from fighting to relative peace?

Jim Runestad: I said I’m not going to engage in (factional infighting), I won’t tolerate it. We’re going to run a unified party, and the people who want to have drama and fights are going to get thrown out or ostracized. Everybody liked that message. They’d seen what it was like in the past, and it was, it was very unifying. So I’ve been really pleased. That’s what I ran on. This is what I’ve been able to accomplish when I’ve been in front of the convention or the state committee.

McNamara: You’re fairly prolific in getting bills passed through the state legislature. Do you think you brought some of those skills of negotiation to bring everybody together within the Republican party?

Runestad: You’re the first person that I’ve talked to who mentioned that. The last year Republicans were in control (of the state legislature) with the Democrat in control (of the governor’s office), I had the second most number of bills signed into office.

Frankly, I wasn’t exactly the favorite of the majority leader Republican (Mike Shirkey) at the time. That adds to the complication, but a lot of it was reaching out to members of committees, chairs of committees and explaining why this is a good bill.

Sometimes it’d have 20 to 30 people in a meeting, all stakeholders to get them to either yes or neutral. And when a chair sees you have a very complex bill that’s a great idea, and you have no opposition, that’s how you get a bill through. And that’s what I really specialized in doing over the last 10 years in office.

McNamara: You don’t have a lot of control over what happens nationally, but the national perception of the Republican Party, of President Trump, can affect how people vote in the state of Michigan. What are you kind of doing to overcome some of that, because these are the worst poll numbers that we’ve seen for the president since his second term started.

Runestad: A lot of it comes down to the candidates you have running for these particular offices. I’ve never been more excited for what we have in terms of the candidates coming out of our convention. We have just such a great cadre of candidates. Mike Rogers is running by himself, and they’re (Democrats) beating themselves up in their primary. Our primary is going to be a tough one on the gubernatorial side, but we’re going to have a fabulous candidate come out of there.

On the national level, I think what we’re seeing is just a result of price of gas. I believe that that can be reversed relatively quickly.

So I think we’re going to be very, very good going into the November elections. We have fabulous candidates, we’ve raised way more money. If you look at the Democrats, (their) party polling is the lowest it’s ever been in its history, so it’s not like, ‘oh, they have some frustration over gas prices, therefore they love the Democrats’. Oh no. The woke policies that they ran on that were they were destroyed by in 2024 is exactly the same policies they are going run again.

McNamara: Can you explain what you mean by woke policies?

Runestad: I love their policy of having boys playing girls sports, it’s a good one for them. They need to continue running on open borders.

Their Attorney General (candidate and current Washtenaw County Prosecutor) Eli Savit was constantly speaking to the Michigan Senate Judiciary committee when the Democrats are in control. (He was in there) with the most woke leftists, ‘free the criminals’, ‘get the criminals out into society’ as anyone I’ve seen coming through the Judiciary Committee.

I think it’s wonderful that they’re doubling down on those woke policies that I just described. I don’t know how they describe them, but that’s how we describe them.

McNamara: In the race for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat who do you want to face Mike Rogers?

Runestad: Well, Abdul El-Sayed performs the worst in in the polling (head to head vs Rogers), but you know that’s temporary.

I know Haley Stevens was booed by 7,400 people going into the (Democratic) convention. You turn on the TV and all you see is Haley Stevens to try to overcome the negativity within the base of the party, They’re (AIPAC) pumping millions into it.

Listen to the full interview using the media player above.

Democrats are locked in a three-way primary battle in the race for US Senate. The candidates are Abdul El-Sayed, Congresswoman Haley Stevens and Senator Mallory McMorrow.  

McMorrow spoke to WDET about how she is campaigning across Michigan, talking with voters about their frustration with the current administration. 

McMorrow: The campaign is going great. I feel really excited about all of the events that we’re doing. We stopped in Saginaw and Bay City on the way up here, and people are really starting to tune into this race. Once you get past the politicos and the people who’ve been paying attention for the last year, the only thing that’s been consistent in this race is the number of people who are undecided. So, we are reaching out to those people every single day. The response is amazing, and it is our ninth oil change on the campaign, so we’re putting in a lot of miles, meeting a lot of people, and it feels awesome.  

McNamara: You’re a car lady, so are we doing the 3,000 mile oil change or the 5,000 mile? 

McMorrow: Oh gosh, we’re probably somewhere in between, we’re not trying to burn it out. 

McNamara: Earlier today, I talked with Jim Runestad, the Michigan GOP chair. I asked him who he wanted to face in the general election. He brought up Abdul Elsayed. He brought up Haley Stevens. You did not get mentioned. How do you receive that news? 

McMorrow: Well, Jim knows me better than anybody else as his colleague every day, and I take that as a compliment. 

McNamara: So, you’ve seen the latest round of polling. There’s always new polls coming out. I hate polls, honestly, because they’re just a snapshot of that particular day, right? What are you seeing, and what are you hearing from the community when it comes to this polling? Is it matching up with what you’ve been getting back from the people you’ve been talking to? 

McMorrow: Like I said, the only thing that’s been consistent is the number of voters who are undecided. So, we have been out on doors all across the state, we have been doing dozens of events. Our brewery tour is still ongoing, and what we hear from voters is people are nervous, they are scared, they are pissed off at this president, who apparently can just tell us that the war with Iran is over, when it isn’t. That’s not how it works, and they want somebody who’s going to fight for them. So, once I’m able to have a conversation and say, “I get it, I Googled how to run for office in 2018 on my very first try, I defeated a Republican incumbent helped build real power, and look at what we’ve been able to get done in Michigan.” Once they hear that, they’re excited, and they’re in. 

McNamara: What’s your base? Because I was talking with Congresswoman Stevens, she’s drawn quite a bit of support from the Black community. Abdul El-Sayed has the built-in Arab American and Muslim community, but what’s your community? 

McMorrow: Michiganders. As many people as possible who want a good life for their family, and the one thing that is a good note in the polling is I am up with independent voters against Mike Rogers by 12 points. 

McNamara: Mike Rogers, he doesn’t have the benefit of a primary. So, how do you go after somebody like that? Because you have to take aim at him, and you have to take some aim at your opponents. 

McMorrow: You do, and it’s a good point on how we frame all of this, because it is a Democratic primary to decide who will face Mike Rogers in November. All eyes are on this race. The Republicans know that control of the U.S. Senate runs through Michigan. If they can get Mike Rogers into the Senate, they block any path that Democrats have of flipping the Senate, and there is a real path. So, they are dumping tens of millions of dollars into this race.

And this is a moment where any Republican in the Congress or the Senate who has decided to stand up to Donald Trump has now lost their seat. Donald Trump has taken on retribution to primary any Republican who doesn’t bend the knee, and that’s how we’re going to go against Mike Rogers, because he’s making a bet right now. He’s got Donald Trump’s full backing. Is he going to stand up for Trump, or is he going to stand up for Michiganders? 

McNamara: The overall theme of the Mackinac Policy Conference is about unity, it’s about two sides coming together, bipartisanship. When you have a president that asks nothing but fealty from the people that are members of his party, how do you do that? Do you buy into slogans like that? Is bipartisanship always necessary?  

McMorrow: It has to be the goal. I sat down with seven Trump voters in Macomb County a few weeks ago and wanted to just get to know them as people first. Everybody wants to put everybody in boxes. You just asked me who’s your base, and I think it is true. It’s Michiganders. I went around the table and I asked, tell me in one word, how you feel about this moment. One woman said great. The others said scared, angry, anxious, pissed, and they are pointing at the president as a lot of the reason why. That he promised to end wars, he has started a number of wars and keeps us in wars, while telling us we can’t afford daycare, we can’t afford Medicare, we can’t afford Medicaid, and to your point has completely remade the Republican Party in his image, and if you don’t have loyalty to Trump, you’re out of the party. 

For us, I think it is critical that Michigan starts to show the way forward. I talk all the time about relationships that I have on the other side of the aisle that I really admire, whether it’s John Damoose or Roger Victory, Senator Bumstead in the Appropriations Committee. We’ve shown that we don’t have to agree on every issue, and we will debate each other passionately, but on areas where we can and want to work together, we do, and we do for the benefit of Michiganders.

Now, that is a rebuke in and of itself of what Trump is selling. Trump is selling a burn it all down, build up a party that is power above anything else to do what he wants to do, and what he wants to do is enrich himself and his family, and “who cares what it does to regular people?” So, yeah, I do believe in bipartisanship, and we have to get there with a Republican party that is not loyal to Donald Trump, and that means anybody who is bending the knee to Trump, we got to defeat. So hopefully we start to get Republicans who recognize that their constituents are the ones that matter and not this president. 

McNamara: To make it to the general election, there’s been some mudslinging. It comes with the territory. How comfortable are you with that? Because your opponent, Haley Stevens completely avoided the question, and, she says she wasn’t overly comfortable with it, essentially when pressed. So, I’m just wondering, does it come with the territory, and you get to move on, you guys can all be friends? Because as I was talking with somebody who follows Michigan politics quite a bit, there’s not a huge gap between yourself and your opponents. 

McMorrow: That’s exactly right. We’re going to have a debate tomorrow, and when you have three Democrats on stage, the policy differences are pretty minimal. Every single one of us wants Michiganders to have health care and wants that to be a guarantee, every single one of us wants to get out of the war with Iran. We have differences of opinions in how we do those things, but there is a stark contrast between the three people on stage and Mike Rogers, who is praising everything Donald Trump does, whether Trump attacks the Gordie Howe Bridge and threatens it to open, and Mike Rogers said, “Good, the President needs that for leverage against Canada.” When he threatened to annihilate all of the people of Iran, Mike Rogers said, “Good, peace through strength.” And that is the thing that I make want to make sure none of us lose sight of. I think that the primary does come with the territory. We should expect that the Republicans are going to unleash everything they have on any of us, so we’re all being put through our paces right now. Every detail about our lives, how we present ourselves, is going to be criticized. The voters will decide, and I believe that makes any of us much better positioned to win in November, because we will have been put through our paces, and the most important thing is that no matter what happens on August 4, we all come together on August 5 to defeat Mike Rogers. 

There’s a lot going on in the state of Michigan, and compounding that there’s a big election that assures new leadership in the top three offices. At the helm is Governor Gretchen Whitmer, who has led the state over seven uneven years. 

Whitmer spoke to WDET about her plans after she leaves office and reflected on her time as governor. 

McNamara: I don’t want to focus on looking back but what was the weirdest thing you had to navigate?

Whitmer: A pandemic, we’ve had incredible weather challenges from floods to tornadoes that have taken the lives of Michiganders and taken their homes. We’ve had a plot to kidnap and to kill me. We have had to navigate righteous demonstrations for racial justice that played out and a number of communities across Michigan during the George Floyd year, and I think we’ve had incredible challenges that that we’ve had to navigate, and yet, I’m always reminding myself, my oath is to the people of Michigan. I’ve got to show up and fight to make sure that we deliver for people and stay focused on fixing things like roads and helping people keep money in their pockets, and that’s always kind of centered me, even with all the chaos in our environment right now. 

McNamara: And you know, providing for the people of Michigan. To that end, I have to give you some credit. You might not remember this, but last year at this time, people were talking about you holding the blue folder over your face in the Oval Office. You cracked the code, because in Trump’s second term, flattery will get you everywhere, I guess. So, is there more milk to be gotten from that bell cow? Can you bring more money to the state? What can we do to get more federal money flowing into the state of Michigan via the federal government? 

Whitmer: Well, I’m going to continue to work at it. The Trump administration, we’ve got a litany of differences, right? But at the end of the day, my job is to show up for the people of Michigan. And while that was a moment in the Oval Office, I was there to advocate for a new fighter mission at Selfridge, and yesterday I signed a bill that ensured that Michigan’s aerospace and defense sector is solid and is growing, but the linchpin is this fighter mission.

So the fact that we got this done with Donald Trump in the White House and me as the governor I think is a testament to the fact that if I stay focused on delivering for Michigan, I can find common ground with just about anybody on some really important things for our state, and that’s what this job is all about.

McNamara: Last year it was difficult finding common ground with Matt Hall, House Speaker, getting a budget deal done. It’s an election year this year, somehow the budget process is moving more smoothly. From your perspective, how is it shaping up? 

Whitmer: Well, it’s not unusual in an election year for the legislature to want to get home and campaign, so budgets sometimes do move faster in election years. I think there are lots of things that are difficult for Michiganders in the Michigan economy right now—the tariff chaos, and coupled with the Iran war, it’s tough—and so I think it’s very important that we deliver a budget on time that actually helps people keep money in their pockets and makes the critical investments in our workforce and our infrastructure, the things that impact Michiganders every day, and help them get ahead. So I can’t open up the Strait of Hormuz unilaterally, but I can deliver a budget on time that helps Michiganders get ahead and defray some of the costs that we’re all bearing, because of the chaos coming out of DC right now.

McNamara: Because of that chaos, there are federal cuts looming for your time out of office. Does Michigan need more revenue, aka taxes? 

Whitmer: I don’t think that there’s really a great hope of getting anything on that front done with a split legislature in an election year. That will be a question for the next set of leaders that come in January 1. 

McNamara: You tried. 

Whitmer: Yeah, and we were successful. We raised $2 billion for our road infrastructure, so I ran on fixing the damn roads. We can say yes, we actually got the biggest investment in that infrastructure in 40 years in the state. But I do think that it is going to be incumbent on the next set of leaders to deal with all the cuts that are coming from the Trump administration and the Republicans in DC, with that house bill one, the Big Beautiful Bill, whatever the hell you want to call it, we know that there is more stress coming on all those fronts because of the actions that they took last year. 

McNamara: You spent a lot of time and effort trying to build the state’s population and build the economic base for people to come here. How are you feeling about that? 

Whitmer: We have seen more people move into Michigan than out for the first time in decades. We see Detroit’s population growing three years in a row. There are a lot of good things happening. Yes, there’s more to do. There’s always more to do, but to make Michigan a place where our young people want to stay, where businesses can find the workforce that they need, where we have a growth mentality, is going to be a continuing effort, needs to be a continuing effort, no matter who follows me in this role. 

McNamara: Two years ago, at the Democratic National Convention, you told me, kind of talking post plans, you wanted to go visit some national parks. Are those plans made?  

Whitmer: They’re not made yet. I leave office January 1, so I’m gonna take a little break, but yeah, I think maybe next spring, summer, my husband and I and our two dogs will hit the road, and I’m looking forward to that. Although I have not driven in eight years, so state police are gonna have to take me out to the state police drag and teach me how to drive again. 

McNamara: There are no national parks in Iowa. Will you visit anyway? 

Whitmer: No! 

Editor’s Note: Iowa is the traditional first stop for any potential presidential candidate. The early nature of the Iowa caucuses make an early success there a springboard to a successful run.

With the 2026 Mackinac Policy Conference underway, politicians, policymakers and journalists are gathering on Mackinac Island this week to discuss major issues facing Michigan and metro Detroit. 

WDET’s Russ McNamara heard about how Michigan’s leadership is handling big issues like gridlock in the state congress, data centers and international conflict. Read some of the key takeaways from today’s interviews and press conferences. 

Gary Peters on the war in Iran 

The ongoing war with Iran has led to a substantial rise in the cost of living. Oil prices rose sharply after Iran closed the Strait of Hormuz 

Michigan U.S. Senator Gary Peters says higher diesel prices are only one part of the problem. 

“You’ve got a third of the fertilizer that goes through the Strait of Hormuz. That’s why food prices are going up dramatically,” Peters said. “Farmers are scrambling to try to get fertilizer, and it’s a whole lot more expensive.” 

Peters says the U.S. will be dealing with economic fall out for a long time, and that the attack on Iran was poorly thought out and hastily executed.  

Governor Gretchen Whitmer signed a bill today that provides $150 million in state money to support upgrades to Selfridge Air National Guard Base in Southeast Michigan. 

According to Peters, the money will help support a new mission for the base and unlock federal funding for further improvements.  

“The really important, exciting thing about it is that because of this seed money… we’re going to bring in nearly $800 million from the federal government,” says Peters. “So we’re going to have the best Air National Guard base in the country.” 

The base is set to get a new fighter jet and air tanker mission. The defense industry adds more than $30 billion to the state economy each year, according to the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. 

Ranjeev Puri wants to see programs continue under next state budget

The budget process in the Michigan House is on a much better track than last year. 

House Minority Leader Ranjeev Puri says the political will is there to get the budget done on time this year.  

“Last year, noticeably, the speaker dragged the budget out well past the constitutional deadline into September, October,” Puri says. “This year, I think there is a motivation to try to get it done on time.” 

Republican Matt Hall held up a lot of the process during his first year as speaker of the House, hoping to send a political message and drive cuts. The deadline to present budget bills to the governor is July 1. 

Representative Puri says Hall is motivated to get a budget done this year so legislators can hit the campaign trail. 

Democrats have a two-seat advantage in the Michigan Senate and Republicans have a six-seat advantage in the House, so a drawn out budget fight is unlikely. 

Democrats are ready to fight to keep things like the RX Kids program for infants and new moms, states Puri. “If we’ve gotten to a place in our political discourse that’s saying that newborns are waste, fraud and abuse, we’re just not going to agree.” 

Puri says another program Democrats see as a sticking point is universal free school meals. 

He praises the state for setting a standard by guaranteeing breakfast and lunch to public school students. “I think that’s something we should take a lot of pride in, just being able to make sure that kids are learning on a full belly.” 

Hall has been critical of the free meal program, and tried to have it cut last year. He targeted mostly social programs for cuts while championing a rollback of the state’s property tax and education tax as a broader drawdown of state spending. 

DTE Energy plans energy storage for data centers 

DTE Energy is using battery energy storage to help provide power for planned data centers – including one in Saline Township.  

LG Energy Solution Vertech will provide energy storage with batteries manufactured in Holland, Michigan. DTE Energy CEO Joi Harris says they’re hoping to get the project completed by the end of next year.  

“It’s not a matter of if these projects will come to fruition – it’s when,” says Harris. “And when the first data center project we’re supporting comes online, expected by the end of 2027, our intention is to pause rate increase for at least two years.” 

Harris said the battery storage facilities will be located near the data center. 

“It’s not going to be on the Saline footprint. It will be built outside the Saline area. And this is clean generation,” Harris said. “What this does is allow us to take excess electrons off the grid and dispatch them as needed.” 

Residents in Saline Township and nearby areas have largely been against the data center despite potential economic benefits. The project was approved by the Michigan Public Service Commission and has moved forward with construction after Saline settled in a lawsuit.

DTE Energy says the battery energy storage represents a $1.6 billion investment. 

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.

It’s a big election year in Michigan, with statewide races for Governor, Secretary of State and U.S. Senate. While consequential and highly publicized, those races are just the tip of the iceberg. 

Local elections and ballot measures, like one on zoning for data centers in Augusta, MI, or a measure that codifies a citizenship requirement for voting in the state constitution, make up over 95% of elected offices in the United States, according to Josh Altic from Ballotpedia.

“There are over 500,000 local offices that get very little attention, and don’t get the information that voters need.”

One step people can take is to look up their sample ballot, and continue their research from there. Oftentimes, it’s hard to know each candidate, and to see their track record or what they stand for.

One place to go for that information is Ballotpedia, a non-partisan organization that calls itself the “digital encyclopedia of American politics.” It compiles comprehensive election information for 32 states, and for 100 major U.S. cities. Curating that information requires savvy digital investigation, says Altic.

“We do a lot of looking in the deep, dark crannies of the internet for anything the candidate has said about their campaign priorities and what their issues are.”

So how does Ballotpedia do it, and what have they learned that can make you a more informed voter this election?

Josh Altic  is the Director of Content at Ballotpedia. He joined The Metro to discuss how Ballotpedia finds information on local elections, and what trends are emerging this election cycle.

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In late 2024, Michigan lawmakers voted to provide tax breaks for large data centers. Since then, local officials across Michigan have seen an influx of proposals. 

Last year, there were more than 15 proposals for data centers across the state. Several are still waiting for the green light, including one in Allen Park. The city’s planning commission has delayed a vote twice this year, requesting further information from Solstice Data.

These proposals come with the promise of jobs, but taxpayers are skeptical. They want to know if the electric grid handle the energy demand data centers create, and how much air, water, and noise pollution they will produce.

Steven Gonzalez Monserrate is a post-doctoral researcher at Goethe University in Frankfort and studies data centers and how they affect the people and the environment.

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

Subscribe to The Metro on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, NPR.org or wherever you get your podcasts.

More stories from The Metro