2012

Tim Pawlenty Polls Behind Thad McCotter in MI

Benjy Sarlin | August 9, 2011, 4:25PM

GOP Presidential Candidate Tim Pawlenty

Tim Pawlenty's numbers haven't looked great anywhere in recent weeks, but the latest from PPP in little-polled Michigan peg him at fringe status, polling last behind candidates like Rep. Thad McCotter (R-MI).

According to PPP, Romney, who won the state in 2008's GOP primaries, currently leads the pack with 24%, followed by Michele Bachmann at 18%. Rick Perry stands at 14%, while Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich have 7% each. Ron Paul has 6%, followed closely by McCotter at 5%. Pawlenty is at a humble 4%.

McCotter is from Michigan so he has some home court advantage. But given the much higher profile campaign from Pawlenty, the results are surprisingly weak. As PPP puts it, "he gets the dubious distinction of being the first serious candidate to poll behind Thad McCotter anywhere."

Thaddeus McCotter

Mitt Romney Takes GOP Friendly Fire In Michigan

Evan McMorris-Santoro | June 8, 2011, 4:52PM

Mitt Romney's got enough to worry about without this: Rep. Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI) is holding a rally Wednesday to accuse Romney of basically being exactly the same as Barack Obama.

Romney is in Michigan this week, stumping through his native land and raising money. Democrats are having a field day, dispatching former Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) to yet again attack him over his opposition to the auto bailouts.

He's facing an even stronger attack from his fellow Republican.

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Pres '12

Unpopular Freshman GOP Governors Could Help Obama's Reelection Bid

Jon Terbush | May 31, 2011, 2:02PM

Gov. Rick Scott (R-FL) and Gov. John Kasich (R-OH)

When several newly minted Republican governors began pushing through broad, unpopular legislation this year, they may have unintentionally aided President Obama's reelection odds.

Emboldened by their party's midterm election day romp, freshman GOP governors in a few crucial swing states immediately began to advance radical legislation upon taking office. But as the cost of those unpopular legislative agendas has now become clear in the form of free-falling approval ratings and incredible buyer's remorse, polls have shown that that same voter discontent could translate into a big 2012 boost for President Obama.

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Michigan

Michigan Labor Professor FOIAs Move Forward

Evan McMorris-Santoro | April 26, 2011, 6:10PM

Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, Michigan

A little less than a month ago, a conservative-leaning policy think tank in Michigan took advantage of the labor strife in Wisconsin to call on three state-run universities to hand over emails related to the Wisconsin protests and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, written by labor studies professors.

So far, the emails from the University of Michigan, Wayne State University and Michigan State University-- requested by the Mackinac Center For Public Policy under the Michigan Freedom Of Information Act -- haven't been handed over. But that could soon change.

According to Mackinac, all three schools have begun the process of compliance with the FOIA request. TPM was able to confirm that's the case with one school, the University of Michigan. Despite a recent email from the president of that university to faculty touting a strong defense of academic freedom, a spokesperson told TPM Michigan law requires the school to push forward with collecting and vetting the emails before possibly turning them over to Mackinac.

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Michigan

GOP State Senator Tries, Fails To Force Poor Kids To Shop At Thrift Stores

Evan McMorris-Santoro | April 25, 2011, 9:10AM

State Sen. Bruce Caswell (R-MI)

Michigan state Sen. Bruce Caswell (R) suggested that children in the state on public assistance be forced to spend their annual clothing allowance at thrift stores, lest the $80 allocated to them every year go to something other than new duds.

In the end, he didn't get what he wanted. But he was able to make sure that $80 will go to clothes and nothing but -- and that people who use the state's Bridge Card electronic benefit system have to go through an extra step before buying clothes for children in their care.

The Republican acknowledges that neither plan would save the economically-listing Michigan a dime. Caswell says he just wants to make sure welfare money is spent on what it's supposed to be spent on.

Caswell's original plan -- which would have made clothing allowance funds redeemable only at thrift stores like Goodwill -- kicked up some ire among progressives in Michigan and around the country. But Caswell told Michigan Public Media that there's nothing wrong with wearing old clothes.

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Michigan

Michigan Schools Ask For More Time To Weigh Mackinac FOIAs

Evan McMorris-Santoro | April 8, 2011, 9:40AM

Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, Michigan

The three state universities with labor studies departments subject to Freedom Of Information Act requests from the Mackinac Center For Public Policy in Michigan haven't made a final decision about what to do about the conservative-leaning think tank's desire to read up on emails about the Wisconsin labor battles and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow.

According to official responses to the FOIAs sent by the universities and shared with TPM by Mackinac, lawyers at Wayne State University and the University of Michigan have asked for 10 more days to decide how to proceed with the requests. Michigan State is still within the original 5-day window to respond, because they received their FOIA several days after the other schools.

Under FOIA rules, government agencies have five business days to respond to an FOIA and can take ten more days after that to announce their final response. Each school has taken that time, meaning it will be several more days before we know how they'll respond to the requests faculty have called extraordinary.

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Michigan

Report: After Michigan FOIAs, Wayne State Takes Down Labor Studies Website

Evan McMorris-Santoro | April 7, 2011, 10:46AM

Mackinac Center in Midland, MI and Wayne State University inset (Detroit, MI)

It looks like conservative-leaning Mackinac Center For Public Policy think tank drew first blood in the battle over labor studies and academic freedom in Michigan.

As Wayne State University considers what to do about the Freedom Of Information Act requests Mackinac sent over last month, lawyers at the school have ordered parts of the Labor Studies Center website shut down over concerns from Mackinac that they violate rules against political advocacy with state resources.

The Michigan Information and Research Service News Service reports (sub req'd) that Wayne has pulled down parts of its labor studies dept website while they're "under review by the university's general counsel to make sure they are not running afoul of state law."

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Michigan

Mackinac Center Explains Why It FOIA'd Emails About Rachel Maddow

Evan McMorris-Santoro | April 5, 2011, 10:36AM

Last week when news of their Freedom Of Information Act requests aimed at labor studies professors from state-run universities in Michigan broke, the conservative-leaning Mackinac Center For Public Policy think tank declined to talk about them. But on Monday night, in a long post on the center's own website, the Mackinac staffer behind the FOIA requests offered a long explanation of why the center wants to know what Michigan labor studies professors were hearing and saying about Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow.

The short version: Mackinac's been at war with labor studies departments for years, and the fight in Wisconsin opened up a new front.

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Michigan

Conservative Think Tank Receives Bomb Threats After Michigan FOIAs

Evan McMorris-Santoro | April 2, 2011, 10:43AM

Mackinac Center for Public Policy in Midland, Michigan

The Mackinac Center For Public Policy -- the conservative-leaning think tank in the news this week after it requested emails from Michigan labor studies professors regarding Wisconsin and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow -- says it has called in the FBI after receiving a series of threatening voicemails that promised to bomb their Midland, Michigan headquarters.

"You are on Main Street," one of the voicemails said, according to details posted on the Mackinac website. "You are the first place to be bombed."

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Michigan

Maddow Gets Radio Silence On Michigan FOIA Questions (VIDEO)

Evan McMorris-Santoro | March 30, 2011, 10:38AM

On her show last night, MSNBC's Rachel Maddow followed up on our story about the labor studies professor FOIAs in Michigan. She found the conservative donors who fund the think tank asking for emails from Michigan professors about, among other things, Maddow herself, less than willing to talk about where they sent their money.

Quick refresher: the Mackinac Center, a Michigan think tank funded by big names in the conservative movement ranging from the Kochs to the Wal-Mart Waltons to the family that founded Blackwater, used the Freedom Of Information Act to request copies of every email sent or received by labor studies professors at state universities that mentioned Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI), the city of Madison and Maddow. The universities have not decided how to respond, but the professors say the FOIAs suggest Mackinac is trying to catch them in illegal political advocacy. Mackinac has declined to speak on the record about the requests.

On last night's episode of her show, Maddow described the response she got from Mackinac and the donors that fund it when she asked about the FOIAs: nervous silence.

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Michigan

Conservative Think Tank Seeks Michigan Profs' Emails About Wisconsin Union Battle ... And Maddow

Evan McMorris-Santoro | March 29, 2011, 10:12AM

Michigan Labor Protesters

A free enterprise think tank in Michigan -- backed by some of the biggest names in national conservative donor circles -- has made a broad public records request to at least three in-state universities with departments that specialize in the study of labor relations, seeking all their emails regarding the union battle in Wisconsin, Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) and MSNBC's Rachel Maddow, TPM has learned.

According to professors subject to the request, filed under Michigan's version of the Freedom Of Information Act, the request is extremely rare in academic circles. An employee at the think tank requesting the emails tells TPM they're part of an investigation into what labor studies professors at state schools in Michigan are saying about the situation in Madison, Wisc., the epicenter of the clashes between unions and Republican-run state governments across the Midwest.

One professor subject to the FOIA described it as anti-union advocates "going after folks they don't agree with."

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Rick Snyder

Buyer's Remorse: Polls Show 3 New GOP Gov's Losing In Do Overs

Jon Terbush | March 23, 2011, 8:33AM

Last year's midterms elections swept incumbents from office nationwide, as voters turned to newcomers -- often Republican newcomers -- for change.

But just months after election day, three new Midwestern governors -- Wisconsin's Scott Walker (R), Ohio's John Kasich (R), and Michigan's Rick Snyder (R) -- have seen their approval ratings fall to the point that polls show them losing hypothetical do-over elections with the candidates they beat last year.

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Michigan

Protests In Michigan Over 'Financial Martial Law'

Eric Kleefeld | March 16, 2011, 1:04PM

Following the pitched political battles over public employee union rights in Wisconsin, Ohio, and elsewhere, another state's fight over finances is heating up. In Michigan, new Republican Gov. Rick Snyder has just passed a bill through the legislature to allow state-appointed financial managers to void municipalities' union contracts.

As the Macomb Daily Tribune reports, the bill has been described by Republican state Sen. Jack Brandenburg, a supporter, as "financial martial law" for localities where finances have gone out of control: "He [an emergency financial manager] has to have the backbone, he has to have the power, to null and void a contract."

Protests in opposition to the measure still don't seem to have reached Madison levels -- that is, the tens of thousands who turned out in Wisconsin -- but there certainly remains the potential that some of Snyder's tougher measures could trigger a backlash.

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Toni Sessoms

Robocall Against MI State House Candidate Uses The Word 'Homosexual' 10 Times

Jillian Rayfield | October 25, 2010, 4:40PM

Toni Sessoms

A robocall put out by the Campaign for Michigan Families accuses openly gay state House candidate Toni Sessoms (D) of being a "candidate with a hidden agenda, a homosexual activist's agenda." And it does so by repeating the word "homosexual" ten times.

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Health Care

States Fighting Health Care Law Also Fighting For Health Care Law Grant Money

Brian Beutler | September 1, 2010, 10:37AM

President Barack Obama

Don't underestimate Republicans' desire to stymie or unwind the health care law. But not all of them are as committed to its demise as Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty (R), who yesterday issued an executive order forbidding his state's officials from applying for grant money from the new law.

It turns out that seven of the states -- Arizona, Idaho, Indiana, Louisiana, Michigan, Nebraska and Nevada -- that have applied and been approved for subsidies to cover the cost of caring for retired state government employees are also part of a coalition of more than 20 states suing the federal government over the constitutionality of the health care law's individual mandate, which experts say is critical to the success of the policy. Minnesota's attorney general, Lori Swanson (D), refused to join to Pawlenty's displeasure.

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