Candidate Jones doesn’t live in Conyers’ district
Detroit City Council President Brenda Jones doesn’t live in the 13th Congressional District, where she’s running for Congress to succeed former U.S. Rep. John Conyers Jr.
Jones lives in the 14th District, which is represented by U.S. Rep. Brenda Lawrence, D-Southfield. Conyers, who resigned in December amid a sexual misconduct scandal, also lives in the 14th District.
Jones isn’t required to live in the district. The only qualifications under the U.S. Constitution for candidates are to be 25 years old, a U.S. citizen for seven years and live in the state they represent.
A Jones representative stressed that “equally as important” as Jones’ qualifying to run for the seat is that she has represented the 13th District’s 270 Detroit precincts for over 12 years as a council member.
“Council President Jones looks forward to the opportunity to continue to represent the citizens in Detroit’s 13th Congressional District, as well as the residents living in the other 11 communities which comprise the 13th Congressional District,” spokeswoman Acquanetta Pierce Glass said in an email.
Jones received endorsements this week from Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan and television celebrity Judge Greg Mathis, who earlier considered a run for the seat but decided against it.
An RNC taste of Michigan
Republican National Committee Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel says predecessor Reince Priebus is still sore a year later about her restoring Jackson, Michigan, as the birthplace of the GOP at the RNC headquarters.
Ripon, Wisconsin, and Jackson both claim to be the birthplace of the Grand Old Party.
Priebus is the former chair of the Wisconsin Republican Party, and McDaniel is the former chair of the Michigan GOP.
After her election as RNC chair, McDaniel mounted a framed picture of the Republican Party’s formal organization “under the oaks” in Jackson on July 6, 1854, on the wall outside her office suite.
“Reince is still upset about it,” McDaniel said, laughing, during a recent interview with The Detroit News.
“There was one day when Reince came back (to RNC headquarters), took it down and put it on my desk.”
She said the distinction between Ripon and Jackson is that the GOP was “conceived” in Ripon but formed in Jackson, where the first party convention was held.
“You don’t celebrate your birthday on the day you were conceived. That would be weird,” McDaniel said.
She also renamed a conference room from the Wisconsin Room to the Michigan Room.
Pence’s PAC gives to Bishop
Vice President Mike Pence’s leadership political action committee has donated $5,400 to the re-election campaign of U.S. Rep. Mike Bishop, R-Rochester, among contributions to more than two dozen members of the House, a White House official told Politico this week.
It will be interesting to see if Pence comes to Michigan to stump for Bishop, who is seeking a third term.
He faces a challenge from Democrat Elissa Slotkin of Holly, a former top-ranking defense official in the Obama administration, who has raised more money than for the last two quarters. Also running in Michigan’s 8th District is Chris Smith of East Lansing.
Schuette jabs Calley
Attorney General Bill Schuette is warning political rivals that if he wins election as Michigan’s next governor, he will try to expose secret documents from current and past administrations.
Schuette’s new government transparency plan includes a call to subject the governor’s office to the Freedom of Information Act, but that “isn’t enough,” he said this week on social media.
“That's why I will create a legal team to release any public documents hidden from taxpayers by prior governors and lieutenant governors.”
While details are unclear, Schuette is using his plan to jab Lt. Gov. Brian Calley, his top competition for the GOP nomination to replace Gov. Rick Snyder.
“Why should some areas of state government be more transparent than the lieutenant governor and governor?” he said.
Schuette failed to mention that Calley also has called for expanding the public records law to the executive and legislative branches, as detailed in his own “clean” government plan released last summer.
Contributors: Melissa Nann Burke, Jonathan Oosting