Detroit is entering a new political era. Detroit City Council President Mary Sheffield has been elected Detroit’s next mayor. Sheffield was endorsed earlier in the campaign by outgoing Mayor Mike Duggan whose twelve years in office marked a new and productive relationship with Lansing.
Duggan’s brand (which just this week is going national) is negotiating and, whether it was the city’s post-bankruptcy comeback or an auto insurance overhaul, we saw new coordination and cooperation between the state Capitol and the state’s largest city.
Nick Khouri knows a lot about this relationship between Detroit and Lansing. He’s worked for two governors, as the state of Michigan Treasurer and for Duggan as the city’s chief of economic development.
On this week’s It’s Just Politics, hosts Zoe Clark and Rick Pluta turn to Nick for his perspective on the relationship between Detroit and Lansing moving forward under the new Sheffield Administration and divided government.
Meanwhile, in Lansing, MI Secretary of State resists federal demand for voter data
The state of Michigan is in the middle of a legal standoff over voter-data privacy. Michigan Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is refusing to share voter information with the federal government. The Justice Department, part of President Donald Trump’s administration, is suing Benson for voter records that include driver’s license numbers and the last four digits of Social Security numbers.
The Justice Department wants the information because it says the state is not doing a good enough job cleaning its rolls of ineligible voters. VoteBeat reporter Hayley Harding joins the podcast to explain why the federal government wants the information, the privacy concerns at stake, and where the legal case stands.
Want to get political updates from Zoe and Rick straight to your inbox? Sign up for the It's Just Politics newsletter!
