Democrats appear to be on the ropes in Michigan after a poll found support for Rep. Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) is dwindling, with the state’s coveted Senate race starting off in 2024 as a “toss-up.”
A poll conducted by the Detriot News/WDIV-TV found that general election voters are relatively split between candidates when Slotkin is up against the three leading Republican contenders, former Detriot police chief Craig Jones and former Reps. Mike Rogers and Peter Meijer, in head-to-head matchups.
Craig is the only one of the three GOP candidates that leads Slotkin in a head-to-head race, 38% to 36%. Against Rogers, who served seven terms in the House before retiring in 2015, Slotkin leads 38% to 37%. Slotkin and Meijer, who jumped into the Senate race in November, are tied at 36%. The percentage of undecided voters is substantial, ranging from 25% to 28%.
Democrats held a narrow 2.7 percentage point lead in a generic ballot test for the U.S. Senate race of 37.4% to Republicans’ 34.7%.
“This U.S. Senate race right now looks exactly as I would expect an open U.S. Senate race in Michigan to look at this stage ― some top-tier names who are starting to build their name ID on a statewide basis,” Glengariff Group founder and pollster Richard Czuba told the Detriot News.
Czuba said the poll reflects that a significant deciding factor in the 2024 election will be the independent voting bloc.
“It’s those independents who are undecided ― a huge bloc of independents sitting out there. That’s exactly what we would expect: [Candidates] go win your nomination and then make a race for the center,” Czuba said.
The seat, soon to be left vacant by the retirement of Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), set off a fierce competition among Republicans to try and win the Democratic stronghold in what will likely be an uphill battle. Though the poll numbers show Republicans practically deadlocked with Democrats in the open seat race, Meijer said in late November that the GOP believes the Michigan Senate race is “unwinnable.”
On the other side, Democrats are rallying mostly behind Slotkin because they need to keep the seat to maintain their narrow majority in the Senate. Slokin’s strongest competitor is Hill Harper, a progressive actor-turned-politician, though the poll found that only 14% of voters knew who he was.
Wednesday’s polling results add to a growing trend that shows Slokin’s lead over her GOP competitors may be slipping. Poll tracking from FiveThirtyEight found that Slokin previously polled significantly higher than her Republican counterparts, at one point being 13 percentage points ahead of Meijer in July of last year. She hovered around a 5 to 7 percentage point lead over Rogers and Craig last summer before shifting down to a 2-point lead over both in November.
Czuba said national Democrats should be concerned about the polling results, particularly because former President Donald Trump leads President Joe Biden in Michigan by 8 percentage points, 47% to 39% — the first time Trump has held a lead over a likely Democratic nominee before an election in the Great Lake State.
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“If I were a Democrat in Michigan, I would be breaking the emergency fire alarms in the White House and demanding to know what the plan is for Michigan,” Czuba said. “Because these numbers are very bad for any incumbent of any party.”
Biden is facing opposition from Michigan Democrats and particularly Muslim Americans, a voting bloc that overwhelmingly supported Biden’s 2020 campaign. Now, the demographic threatens to withhold votes in 2024 over the administration’s stance on the war between Israel and Hamas, a move that could prove disastrous for the president’s reelection chances.