Democrat Hillary Clinton will stump for votes Thursday in the presidential battleground of Macomb County, where Republican Donald Trump’s campaign has generated its most enthusiasm in Michigan.
Clinton’s early afternoon speech on jobs and economic policies at an automotive and defense industry manufacturing facility in Warren is seen as going on offense against Trump in a county that last sided with a Republican presidential candidate in 2004 for then-President George W. Bush’s re-election.
Republicans see weakness in Clinton’s pathway to victory in Michigan with the visit to Macomb County, home of the conservative Democrats who helped the GOP’s Ronald Reagan win the presidency in 1980 and get overwhelmingly re-elected in 1984.
“She’s coming to Macomb County for one reason — because it’s home of the Reagan Democrats,” said state Sen. Jack Brandenburg, R-Harrison Township. “It tells me that Michigan’s still in play.”
Aside from northern Michigan, Macomb County was the only area where Trump held a lead over Clinton in July 30-Aug. 1 statewide poll commissioned by The Detroit News and WDIV-TV. Clinton held a nine-point lead over Trump in the survey of likely voters.
“The Clinton campaign is on 100 percent offense,” said Republican consultant Jeff Timmer, a Trump critic who says he won’t vote for Clinton. “She’s going in the only places where Trump has a chance of tipping the scale.”
Clinton’s early polling advantage over Trump in Michigan gives her “the luxury” of campaigning in Macomb County before Labor Day, Timmer said.
Thursday’s speech is Clinton’s first campaign stop in Macomb County this election cycle. During the run-up to the March 8 primary, Clinton focused most of her energy on campaigning in Detroit and Flint before suffering an upset loss to Vermont U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Sanders campaigned in Macomb County, railing against international trade agreements at a rally at a Macomb Community College gymnasium where Trump commanded a larger crowd one day earlier.
Clinton narrowly defeated Sanders by 1,355 votes in Macomb County, but lost the 9th Congressional District in southern Macomb and Oakland counties by 2,333 votes. Trump, by comparison, crushed his GOP primary rivals in Macomb County, winning 48 percent and more than twice as many votes as Ohio Gov. John Kasich.
“I think you skip over Macomb at your peril,” Ed Bruley, the longtime chairman of the Macomb County Democratic Party. “I think she was a bit outworked in the primary, frankly.”
Clinton is “making the right moves now” by coming to Warren and focusing her message on economic policies that affect the middle class, Bruley said.
“I think it’s going to be close. I don’t think it’s a walkaway,” he said of the Clinton-Trump race in Macomb County. “But I think Clinton is doing the right stuff. By coming here, she’s demonstrating that she’s committed.”
Trump’s Macomb inroads
Trump has made inroads with blue-collar workers through his opposition to the 22-year-old North American Free Trade Agreement involving Canada and Mexico as well as the pending 12-nation Trans Pacific Partnership. Clinton has distanced herself from both trade pacts after once supporting them.
“I think that she sees a vulnerability that she has in Macomb County, where a lot of voters are responding to Trump, particularly on trade and certainly on the Second Amendment,” said Jamie Roe, a Republican consultant from Macomb Township. “There’s a lot of concern among voters here who like their gun rights that could be affected by Hillary Clinton.”
“Trump’s message on trade works here, and she’s had sort of differing positions on it over the course of time, and I’m not sure she’s entirely trusted on it,” Roe said.
The New York real estate tycoon also has appealed to voters by emphasizing his business acumen compared to the experience of Clinton, who has spent much of her career in public service.
“I don’t know what job she ever created, but Trump creates jobs,” said Josephine Valice, 71, of Harrison Township.
But Democrats argue they have a message to undercut the celebrity billionaire’s argument that he has been a job creator and that former President Bill Clinton’s NAFTA has shipped manufacturing jobs overseas at the expense of American workers.
Most of the Donald J. Trump Collection’s line of suits, ties, dress shirts and other apparel are made overseas and in Mexico, according to FactCheck.org.
“Everything this guy has supposedly made to sell is made outside of the U.S.,” Bruley said. “He’s not believable. He says a good game, he doesn’t do a good game.”
Invitation only
Clinton’s campaign speech at Futuramic Tool & Engineering in Warren comes on the heels of Trump’s roll-out of his revamped tax and economic plan Monday before the Detroit Economic Club.
“She’s talking about jobs and the economy — it’s what she needs to do — and she’s doing it in the right place,” Bruley said.
Futuramic Tool & Engineering is hosting the speech, but company officials declined to comment Wednesday.
Because of space restrictions, Clinton’s speech is an invite-only affair. The Clinton campaign expects to fill 500 seats inside the manufacturing facility on Gibson Drive.
Trump’s Monday address at Cobo Center was closed to 1,500 economic club members and guests, though a group of protesters got in as the guest of a 23-year-old man who misled the club about his employer.
Clinton was set to arrive in Metro Detroit Wednesday evening for a closed-door fundraiser at the Birmingham home of Ethan Daniel Davidson, son of the late industrialist and Detroit Pistons owner William Davidson.
Helping Dems down-ballot
Clinton’s campaigning against Trump in Macomb County also could help Democrats down-ballot.
The Clinton campaign has been building a joint operation with the Michigan Democratic Party to help Democrats win offices at the state and local level.
Democrats have targeted Macomb County’s 30th District as one of nine seats they need to win to regain a majority in the Michigan House of Representatives.
The seat is held by term-limited GOP Rep. Jeff Farrington of Utica, whose wife, Diana, is trying to succeed him in a race against Democrat Michael Notte, the son of the late Sterling Heights Mayor Richard Notte.
Timmer, the Lansing-based GOP political consultant, argues Trump could doom other Republicans in battlegrounds like Macomb County in November.
He has been urging fellow Republicans to abandon hope of Trump becoming the first Republican presidential candidate since George H.W. Bush in 1988 to win Michigan and instead focus on salvaging the GOP majority in state government and Michigan’s congressional delegation.
“We’ve got to get as many down ballots candidates on the lifeboats as we can,” Timmer said.
(517) 371-3661
Join the Conversation
To find out more about Facebook commenting please read the Conversation Guidelines and FAQs
Comments