EAST LANSING, MI — Ever since this presidential campaign started, most voters have consistently told pollsters they didn’t want another rematch between Joe Biden and Donald Trump.
But now, it seems that’s exactly what they’ve got.
This is the first time there’s been a second straight election with the same candidates since Dwight Eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson in 1956 — and the first time since Franklin D. Roosevelt that anyone has been nominated three times in a row.
So what is Michigan likely to do in November?
Mark Grebner, the funny, irreverent and sometimes brilliant founder of Practical Political Consulting has been studying elections in the state for half a century. Even though it now looks as if the field is set, except for the Republican choice for vice-president, he isn’t convinced at all that it actually is.
“I think that there are events that are going to occur that we can’t know about now that will make a lot of difference,” he said.
That happens, of course, in virtually every election campaign; foreign policy crises and real, or rumored scandals. But this year is different, partly because the candidates are the two oldest in history.
“I don’t know how likely it is that Biden really will be the nominee,” said the veteran consultant. “I mean, I could see him addressing the convention and saying, you know, I’ve decided I shouldn’t do it after all,” which would be interesting, to say the least.
On the other hand, he added “it seems clearly that Trump has some sort of ongoing medical issues as well,” based on his increasing verbal mistakes and difficulty pronouncing words.
“They both shouldn’t be running, but there’s a difference in how people dislike them,” said Grebner, who once worked mainly with Democrats but now calls himself a member of the “Will Rogers Party,” after the famous 1930s cowboy comedian.
“With Biden, we have had a president who has kind of objectively done okay, better than okay. But it doesn’t make any sense for him to be the nominee. The odds that he will be mentally up to the job in six months is uncertain and in three years, not good,” he said.
“However, nobody is really afraid of Joe Biden. There are at least 10-20 million Americans who can’t sleep at night because of the thought of Donald Trump back in office. They really feel he’s a danger to what this nation stands for.”
Plus, he added, “for the first time since the Know-Nothings in 1856, we have a party where the truth, where what is true is not an issue any more — it’s off the table. That’s the case with the Republicans today. There’s no constituency for truth, and if you insist on truth, you are written out of the party.”
Democrats, on the other hand, “appear to have adopted the same standards the Roman Catholic Church uses for choosing a pope. The only rule is you have to be alive, and they can’t make you quit.”
But what does all that mean for November? You might think this would be a prime opportunity for a third-party candidate, but Grebner doesn’t see that having a major effect, at least now.
“Now if Ralph Nader were to get in the race, he might get a lot of votes,” he said. But given that the famous crusader is 90, that doesn’t seem likely. The No Labels movement has failed to convince major figures like Nikki Haley and Joe Manchin to accept its nomination, and it’s unclear who else can get on the ballot.
As for Michigan, if nothing dramatic happens between now and Nov. 5, “I think Biden prevails,” despite current polls, Grebner said. The state has voted Democratic in seven of the last eight elections, and he thinks that Trump underperformed in the state’s February 27 primary. He also said he sees signs of rural Republicans “quietly leaving the MAGA tent.”
But, as the great Chuck Berry sang, you never can tell. This year, that’s possibly more accurate than usual.
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Padded Voter Rolls: Michigan has more registered voters than Ohio, which sounds unusual, given that Ohio has nearly two million more people. Not only that, Michigan has more than 200,000 more registered voters than the entire voting age population, which sounds like … something corrupt is going on.
But it isn’t, according to various investigations and Jonathan Brater, the Michigan election director, who explained to reporters that state election law forbids officials from purging inactive voters from the rolls for years. That number should come down, he said, when more than 500,000 registrations are set to be erased next year.
The state does remove voters from the rolls once they are confirmed to have died, and earlier this year, a federal court judge in Grand Rapids dismissed a lawsuit claiming Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson wasn’t moving fast enough to purge the rolls of dead people. U.S. District Judge Jane Beckering said Michigan actually was moving faster on this than most states.
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(Editor’s Note: A version of this column also appeared in the Toledo Blade.)
