By Jim Ellis — Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2025
Governor
Michigan Rep. John James (R-Farmington Hills)
For the first time in the modern political era, Michigan will host an open Governor and open Senate race in the same election cycle. Former Congressman Mike Rogers (R), who fell just 19,006 votes (three-tenths of one percent) short of defeating Rep. Elissa Slotkin in the 2024 open Senate race, is sending signals that he would like to try again in 2026. If so, he should be a lock to win the party nomination.
Before winning two House races in 2022 and 2024, Rep. James had lost two close Senate races. In 2018, he surprised the entire political world by finishing within 6.5 percentage points of upsetting veteran Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D) in what was not viewed as a race with close potential. Two years later, James did even better, closing the gap with now-retiring Sen. Gary Peters (D) to 1.7 percent.
Post-redistricting in 2022, James defeated by half a percentage point former Macomb County prosecutor and ex-judge Carl Marlinga (D) in a Detroit suburban congressional district that favored the Democrats. He increased his victory percentage, again against Marlinga, to 6.1 percentage points in the 2024 re-election campaign.
President Donald Trump, who carried Michigan by just over 80,000 votes in November, looks to have breathed new life into a state Republican Party, which hadn’t seen a statewide victory here since Trump upset Hillary Clinton in 2016.
The new On-Message survey conducted for the Harbor Strategic Public Affairs company (Jan. 17-19; 1,000 likely Michigan Republican primary voters; text to web) yields very good news for Rep. James. He posts a commanding 46-6-4-3-1 percent advantage over state Senate Minority Leader Aric Nesbitt (R-Porter Township), former Attorney General Mike Cox, 2022 gubernatorial candidate Kevin Rinke, and ex-state House Speaker Tom Leonard, respectively. Of this group, Cox has been the most active potential candidate to date.
The Republican downside of Rep. James running statewide is that his politically marginal 10th Congressional District could become the Democrats’ top national conversion opportunity. Marlinga is making moves to run for a third time, but the Democratic leadership will likely look for a candidate whom they perceive would be stronger since the former judge was a weak fundraiser and lost two consecutive races in a winnable district.
Furthermore, the GOP would likely not have as viable a candidate as Rep. James in the party’s 2026 attempt to hold the toss-up CD.
Conversely, the Governor’s race features interesting Republican possibilities. Toward the end of last year, three-term Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan surprisingly announced that he would enter the open Governor’s race (incumbent Gretchen Whitmer (D) is ineligible to seek a third term) and would do so as an Independent candidate. Though the mayoral campaigns are nonpartisan because party affiliation is not listed on the ballot, it was clear that Duggan associated himself with the Democrats. Therefore, announcing his gubernatorial bid as an Independent came as a surprise.
As a three-term citywide incumbent from the state’s largest municipality, Duggan will be a formidable gubernatorial candidate and has a chance to make this 2026 Michigan political contest a legitimate three-way race.
A strong Duggan performance could allow a credible Republican candidate such as James to win the statewide race with only plurality support. Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, who comes from the left-wing faction of the Democratic Party, has also announced her gubernatorial candidacy and is considered the favorite for the nomination at least at this early juncture.
Duggan, portraying himself as a more centrist candidate, could attract significant Democratic and Democratic-leaning Independent support, which is clearly his strategic objective, thus weakening the party’s prospects because their voters would be split.
Therefore, such a setup becomes much more enticing to a prospective Republican candidate who could unite the GOP for the general election. Rep. James certainly would have such ability.
At this point, the Congressman has not committed himself to running statewide, but polling such as this, and seeing his 77:6 percent positive favorability index from the OnMessage survey sample, is certainly another encouraging point.
The OnMessage data provides even more evidence that Michigan will be one of the top political states in the 2026 election cycle. Expect to see many political stories coming from this domain throughout the next two years.
