LANSING, MI – A year ago, few people outside Michigan had heard of Gretchen Whitmer, the state’s new governor. Three years ago, it’s likely most people in the state hadn’t heard of her either.
Yet now, she has become close to a national figure – and there is increasing speculation that she may well be the Democratic vice-presidential nominee. But will she? Should she be?
What is clear is that her newfound fame is thanks in large part to President Trump’s attacking her as “the woman from Michigan,” who, he claimed, “just sits there and blames the federal government.
“She doesn’t get it done.”
Whitmer quickly and cleverly responded. Rather than attacking Mr. Trump, she took to social media to answer. “Hi, my name is Gretchen Whitmer, and that governor is me,” she tweeted.
“I’ve asked repeatedly and respectfully for help. We need it. No more political attacks,” she said, before asking the president to send personal protection equipment and masks and test kits.
“You said you stand with Michigan –prove it.”
That made her an overnight hero on the liberal talk show and cable television circuit. Soon, she began appearing wearing a T-shirt under her blazer with the slogan: That Woman From Michigan.
Vogue Magazine soon appeared with a story titled, “Why ‘That Woman From Michigan,’ should be on Joe Biden’s short list for VP.”
Biden, by now the overwhelming favorite to win the Democratic presidential nomination, fed the rumors himself. On Monday (April 6) he invited her to be one of the first guests on his new podcast, “Here’s the Deal.” Introducing her, the former vice-president said “Governor Whitmer is an outstanding governor. She is one of the most talented people in the country, in my view.”
Earlier, when asked if she was in contention for vice president, he said that she was – and had been even before her dust-up with Donald Trump. Biden, who has pledged to pick a woman as his running mate, said that Michigan’s governor had made his short list “in my mind two months ago,” before the coronavirus pandemic.
Indeed, there were some early signs that Whitmer had been noticed nationally; she was selected this year to give the Democratic response to President Trump’s State of the Union address Feb.4
But will she be on the national ticket?
Odds are, probably not, for a number of reasons.
Gretchen Whitmer seemed, in fact, to take herself out of contention on March 15, when she said on MS-NBC: “I feel it is important that he has a woman running mate, to be honest … “I’m going to help him (choose) … but it’s not going to be me.”
That isn’t, of course, the same as saying she would not accept the nomination if offered, and modesty is expected. Nobody is supposed to act as if they were grasping for the nomination.
But in reality, Whitmer’s credentials are fairly thin, especially considering she would be a heartbeat away from a president who would be 78 when he took office.
Michigan’s governor, who will be 49 this year, has spent virtually her entire life in and around Lansing, Michigan, where she grew up and went to college and law school before being elected to the legislature at age 29 and advancing through both houses.
Other than a brief stint as appointed county prosecutor, she has been in state politics her entire adult life. Her national credentials are relatively small; her international ones, non-existent.
Gretchen Whitmer is also a first-term governor, in office less than a year and a half — who does not yet have an impressive record of accomplishment. She campaigned brilliantly on the slogan “Just fix the damn roads,” and was elected by an impressive margin over a better-known GOP opponent.
She claimed, because of her background in the legislature, to be able to bring lawmakers together to forge bipartisan solutions to the state’s pressing problems. But she hasn’t often succeeded.
This, to be fair, may be more due to GOP unwillingness to compromise than anything else, but it hasn’t happened.
Her first proposal to fix Michigan’s worst-in-the-nation roads, a 45-cent a gallon gas tax, got nowhere, and even many Democrats in the legislature seemed to shy away from the idea.
When it was clear her fellow lawmakers wouldn’t go along, she settle for issuing $3.5 billion in new bonds to fix the roads, something that did not require legislative approval.
That was better than nothing, but, as critics noted, does nothing for the many small and local roads that are in bad shape.
The bonding money will only fix major roads and deteriorating bridges along the Michigan’s major highways – and doesn’t do enough of that. Experts say more than $2 billion a year would be needed for a decade to get the state’s roads where they should be.
That’s not to say Gretchen Whitmer would be a Sarah Palin-like disaster as running mate. She is charismatic and a fast learner.
But those close to the former vice-president have said the most likely candidates are U.S. Sens Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Kamala Harris of California, both of whom were presidential contenders this year, and have considerable Washington experience.
Whitmer’s time may well come – but probably not yet.
Footnote: If Whitmer did become the nation’s first female vice-president, she would be the first Michigan native ever elected to the office. (None have been elected president, either.) It would also mean the state would have its first black governor, Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist, a 37-year-old software engineer from Detroit.
(Editor’s Note: A version of this column also appeared in the Toledo Blade.)
Photo courtesy of Bridge Magazine
