Question 1): When it comes to present-day political campaigns, it’s all about the money. Or is it? Can we assume that whoever raises the most campaign cash will win his or her party’s nomination in the the Aug. 4, 2026, primary and then be chosen by Michigan’s voters in the Nov. 3 general election? And can we take for granted that raising the most money means a candidate for one of the state’s top offices actually has sufficient cash-on-hand to convert it into victory at election time? What about the so-called “burn rate,” meaning that the candidate is currently spending most of what s/he raises trying to rake in more moolah? For instance, a review of the reporting period between July 21 and Oct. 20 reveals that all eight of the big-name gubernatorial candidates reported a burn rate of well over 50%.
So, how are all these candidates performing at the present time? Not just gubernatorial candidates but those for Secretary of State and Attorney General as well? Based on fund-raising, who will win? Who will lose or possibly drop out of their respective races well short of the finish line?
Answer 1): The Information & Research Service (MIRS) newsletter fly-specked the most recent campaign finance reports and found that Democratic gubernatorial frontrunner Jocelyn BENSON, the current Secretary of State, had the best filing in terms of adding to her cash on hand (+562,207). Outside of former Attorney General Mike Cox (more on him below), she had the lowest burn rate of 54 percent. And she still has $2.98 million cash on hand, far ahead of her rivals Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrest II ($378,457) and Genesee Co. Sheriff Chris Swanson ($385,189). Benson observed in a campaign press release that the $4.7 million she’s raised so far is more than any other Democratic gubernatorial candidate in history running for an open seat at this point in the cycle. By comparison, by Oct. 2017, then-candidate Gretchen WHITMER had raised $2.3 million with $1.5 million in the bank.
This is one race where money and the certain Democratic nominee are in sync — Benson will be the Democrat nominated next Aug. 4, for sure, unless some unforeseen catastrophe occurs.
For the Republicans, it’s not so clear.
Republican John JAMES (R-Shelby Township) raised the most money in raw dollars through his aggressive mail campaign, $1.378 million. He also had the highest number of contributions (12,558) from the largest number of people (8,700) and largest chunk of Michigan voters –- 3,381.
However, James also had a 70% burn rate, and added only $413,954 to his cash-on-hand. Furthermore, the current 10th CD Congressman failed to show up in Grand Rapids for the first of three debates between the seven Republican candidates this past Tuesday. His campaign announced that he would not attend any primary debates until the field is more “set,” whatever and whenever that may be. Instead, James, who knows little about state government, released a 30-second campaign video on border security, and he railed against the extension of Obamacare health care benefits (which Democrats are pushing for) that James noted will include illegal immigrants. James, far ahead of his rivals in all polls taken so far, evidently believes that he will outspend his rivals, coast on name ID, and can’t be caught over the next nine months. He’ll simply run out the clock.
So far, James’s fund-raising numbers back that calculation up. In the most recent quarter, James outperformed Republican opponents Aric NESBITT (R-Lawton) (+$159,249) and Tom LEONARD (+$100,145). James’s numbers were also stronger than independent candidate Mike DUGGAN, who added to his largesse by only $145,510 because of his 88% burn rate.
NESBITT raised $423,810 this past period for a total of $2.7 million for the campaign. He spent $264,561 or 62% of it, and now has $2.1 million in the bank.
Nesbitt had 713 contributions from 619 entities, 96 percent coming from Michigan. Nesbitt had four contributions from Washington D.C. and a smattering from other states.
Former state House Speaker Tom LEONARD reported bringing in $290,630, of which $80,000 came out of his pocket. He’s now raised $936,948 for the cycle, spent $227,730 and has $709,293 in cash on hand. Leonard has put a total of $105,610 of his own money into the race, accounting for 11 percent of his total.
MIRS noted that Leonard also used national donors to a greater extent this cycle, getting 43 percent of the people who donated from him out of state. Of the people who donated to his campaign this period, 57% were from Michigan, 6.5% from Florida, 5.5% from Connecticut, 4.5% from California, and 3.7% from Texas. He had donations from people in every state in the country except for six.
Then there is ex-A.G. Mike Cox, who cut his campaign a big $2 million personal check, making it $3.5 million he’s given his campaign overall. However, the $152,539 he raised from others was less than the $218,762 he spent for the period. With his own $3.5 million, Cox has the most cash on hand with $3.79 million.
While an attorney in the private sector during the past decade, Cox successfully helped litigate a settlement for the survivors of the Robert ANDERSON sex scandal at the University of Michigan.
Had Cox not cut that big check, the $152,539 he raised from others was less than the $218,762 he spent for the period. With his $3.5 million in personal money, Cox has the most cash on hand among Republicans with $3.79 million — more even than Benson.
Longshot Republican candidate Ralph REBANDT, a pastor by trade, is much wealthier than pastors usually are. He dropped in more than $800,000 of his own money. He raised $124,225 from 65 people, of whom six were from out of state, meaning 91 percent of his contributors have a Michigan address. This was Rebandt’s first report.
Karla WAGNER from the failing AxMITax petition initiative raised $2,875 and spent all but $255 of it. Another long-shot gubernatorial candidate, trucker Anthony HUDSON, didn’t meet the filing deadline.
Again, going forward, Cox has the largest cash on hand number among Republicans with $3.79 million, James is at $2.27 million, Nesbitt at $2.1 million, and Leonard at $709,293,
What about Independent candidate Mike Duggan, currently Detroit’s mayor, who won’t have to worry about winning a 8/4 primary — he’ll be the Independent nominee come Nov. 3, 2026. Duggan has $2.46 million cash on hand — not too shabby.
During the last reporting period, DUGGAN raised another $1.176 million, bringing his total raised to $4.378 million. However, he spent nearly everything he raised, $1.03 million, and now has $2.46 million in cash on hand. For this period, Duggan’s burn rate was a whopping 88 percent.
Of his 945 contributions from 806 individuals, 734 were from Michigan (91%). He had 15 from Florida and seven from New York.
On Nov. 3, 2026, expect to see Benson and Duggan on the ballot, but the Republican will depend on whether James’s strategy wins out, or whether he has miscalculated and Cox, Leonard or Nesbitt will catch him.
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Secretary of State: Remember, nominations for this office don’t run through an Aug. 4, 2026, primary. They will be decided at state party conventions held post-primary. Candidates will have to appeal to only a few thousand delegates, not hundreds of thousands of state primary voters, so the fund-raising numbers will be nowhere near as robust as for the gubernatorial candidates.
That said, former state Senator Adam HOLLIER (D-Detroit) outraised the field of both Republicans and Democrats running for the chance to take over as Michigan Secretary of State come 2027.
Hollier, an African-American, raised nearly $349,000 out of the gate in his run, with nearly $105,000 coming from individuals and $244,000 coming from political action committees. His campaign has nearly $345,000 after spending just over $4,000.
Republican Amanda LOVE, a Clarkson school board member, while behind with overall cash on hand, raised nearly $124,000, all from individual donations. Her campaign ended up spending more than $18,000, giving her a total remaining of almost $106,000 cash on hand. Love has nearly $53,000 in debt owed by the committee.
Another Oakland Co. Republican activist, Monica Yatooma, raised $109,000, spent $26,000, and has $82,300 cash on hand. She’s considered the frontrunner for the GOP nod by some.
Ingham County Clerk Barb BYRUM, a Democrat and former state Representative, was the candidate with the third most cash on hand, with nearly $104,000. She ended up raising more than $69,000 for the quarter and spending more than $16,000.
Another African-American, Deputy Secretary of State Aghogho EDEVBIE, a Democrat, raised more than $73,000 and spent nearly $90,000. He was the candidate with the highest burn rate for the period after spending down the more than $194,000 raised for the cycle, leaving his campaign with less than $35,000.
Macomb County Clerk Anthony FORLINI, a Republican former state Representative, raised more than $53,000 and spent more than $10,000, giving him nearly $43,000 cash on hand. He’s a late entry in the race but is considered the best qualified Republican by many.
It’s simply too early to predict how this race will shake out. At this point, anything can happen.
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Attorney General: This job, too, will be decided the same way as Secretary of State, and the same rules apply on fund-raising and the mode of nomination.
In this race to succeed term-limited Attorney General Dana NESSEL, Oakland County Prosecuting Attorney Karen McDONALD raised more in the most recent reporting period with $272,485. That gives her nearly $1 million raised for the campaign ($945,183) and $625,691 in cash on hand. The closest to McDonald was fellow Democrat Mark TOTTEN (the 2014 Democratic A.G. nominee), who raised $148,568 and has $200,211 in cash on hand.
Washtenaw County Prosecutor Eli SAVIT raised $94,582 and now has $159,846 in the bank.
On the Republican side, Birmingham attorney Kevin KIJEWSI is leading with $54, 083 cash on hand after raising $55,583. Eaton County Prosecutor Doug LLOYD raised $61,525 and has $46,556 in cash on hand. 2022 Republican nominee Matt DePERNO may also run again, but he did not turn in any documents to the Bureau of Elections by the end of filing day.
McDonald will almost certainly by the Democratic nominee on Nov. 3, 2026, but who wins the GOP nod is an open question.
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One name glaringly missing in your report in the SOS race is Monica Yatooma – considered the front-runner by GOP insiders.
Amanda Love has been campaigning for the seat as well and has raised a significant amount of funding. She is on the Clarkston School Board.
Both Yatooma and Love are from Oakland County.
Matt Deperno is currently tied up defending criminal proceedings – while Lloyd and Kijewski are actively campaigning.
Secretary of State Campaign Finance Report has been updated …
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Interesting article, Bill. I will defer to Leanne as to who the additional GOP candidates are, especially since I don’t know any of them.
What’s interesting is the burn rate, and what they are burning the money on. If it being burned mostly in fundraising, that can be more problematic than if it is being burned on staff or “consultants” (who are usually pollsters of some sort or another). But studying burn rates usually occur in political post-mortems, just ask Perry Johnson and James Craig after their 2022 campaigns.
As for some of the candidates, it’s nice to see that Mr. Hollier has found an office he does not need valid signatures for; that Mr. Leonard has friends out of state; and Mr. James feels that he can financially carpet bomb his way to the nomination. Ms McDonald, who seems to be in the same financial carpet-bombing mood as Mr. James, may have to explain on the initial Danielle Stislicki murder trial went so far south (and may do so again if there is no new evidence) when this trial starts in 2026 and what she will do – and argue – when Ethan Crumbley appeals his life w/o parole given the crimes he committed were done at age 15 and our Michigan Supreme Court has effectively raised the age for that sentence to 21 in the PARKS and PEOPLE OF MI v. ANDREW MICHAEL CZARNECKI cases. And it’s retroactive. But hey, it may give Justice Bernstein another opportunity to raise LWOP to 25 as he substitutes socio-political psychobabble for constitutional reasoning. And could be an interesting campaign issue when two of the Court’s Democrats seek to return to the Court. Regardless, more material for us to enjoy in future TBRs.
Monica Yatooma won the straw vote on Mackinac Island several weeks ago and has raised the most campaign funds of any GOP contender for Michigan Secretary of State.
She is the first Chaldean-American Republican to run for statewide office in Michigan. Her candidacy is historic and she has been networking among business owners in that community for fundraising.
She lacks significant government background, however, to be elected as Secretary of State – as does Ms. Love whose only major government experience is as a school board member.
Anthony Forlini is well-versed in election law given his status as a former state legislator and administering elections since 2020 as Macomb County Clerk. His qualifications as an election administrator far surpass that of either Ms. Yatooma or Ms. Love.
Thanks for the info!
Republican donors must get off the sidelines, but they refuse to in the delegate convention. Both Lloyd and forlini are capable of raising $250,000+ a quarter, the issue they face is the donors don’t want to spend money on a 2022 repeat. Interesting to see what will happen this cycle, but it is clear that those two are the two down ballot candidates needed to help Mike rogers and our eventual governor nominee get across the finish line.
The Michigan Department of Attorney General has been a disaster under Democrat Dana Nessel with more losses than the 1962 New York Mets.
The most recent debacle was her office’s double murder prosecution of Jerome Kowalski.
Judge Matthew Stewart described the case as a “blemish” on the Livingston County court system, expressed sympathy with the defendant’s family, and took the unusual step of a plea agreement with defendant without the consent of the AG that will likely end up with Kowalski being discharged with time served.
Even though the plea agreement was objected to by Nessel’s office, Dana Nessel promoted the plea deal as a victory on her Michigan Department of Attorney General website.
A well-financed campaign by a respected prosecutor such as Doug Lloyd could result in a general election victory over any nominated Democratic opponent.
Manuela Garza says
(Edit)Dana Nessel has been a disappointment to progressive Democrats.
Patrick Miles should have been nominated as AG for the Democratic Party at the 2018 Michigan Democratic Party convention.
As a member of Congress John James should know that it is against the law for undocumented immigrants to get ACA, Medicare or Medicaid benefits, and Democrats are not trying to change that.
The fig leaf: a federal law passed 39 years ago requires hospitals that accept Medicare to provide a medical screening examination and necessary treatment to stabilize any patient with an emergency medical condition, regardless of their ability to pay.
If an ambulance shows up at the ER with a shooting victim, traffic accident victim or someone having a heart attack John James apparently feels we need to check their immigration status before trying to save their life and if they are in the country illegally, let them die.
“As a member of Congress John James should know that it is against the law for undocumented immigrants to get ACA, Medicare or Medicaid benefits, and Democrats are not trying to change that.”
This is a lie. Federal Medicaid dollars are being lavished on illegal immigrants. These expenditures have absolutely nothing to do with EMTALA requirements.
CMS Administrator Dr. Mehemet Oz posted the preliminary results of a Medicaid audit on social media [DrOzCMS on ‘X’ – @DrOzCMS], on 31 October, showing that California, D.C., Illinois, Washington, Colorado, and Oregon lavished $ 1.4 billion in federal dollars on illegal aliens, with California exceeding $1.3 billion alone.
No results from Michigan, yet, due to careful concealment of the true numbers by MDHHS, but MDHHS will be audited soon along with the rest of the states.
mene mene tekel upharsin is coming
Mamdani > Benson, the Emperor’s friend
Cuomo > Duggan, the Emperor’s chaos agent to confuse the ill-informed and cause ticket splitting
Sliwa > James/Nesbitt/Cox/Leonard, et al, the rep of the escape conditioned mensch/mice
GOP had better grow a spine and flip the script or it’s gonna be woe and lamentations all over again. You’ve got 1 year to figure it out.
For every fiddle and Titanic deck chair, Caesar has a trial lawyer and paid in full judge waiting.
In the meantime, Hail Caesar!
DataRepublican (small r) [@DataRepublican on ‘X’] began a thread on 04 November which reveals just how sophisticated the Democrat donor class is and how feckless the Republican donor class is.
A taste:
“The problem with Republican donors playing catch-up is that it’s also structural.
If you gave me a hundred million dollars, I would have no idea how to spend it to mobilize voters.
But Open Society would know how to squeeze every last penny for maximum impact.”
“As an example, look at Indivisible job postings (for context, Indivisible organized NoKings). Their postings speak an entirely different vocabulary of expertise which is foreign to anyone who’s working in the private sector.”
“It’s a *structural* problem. The machine which spends billion of dollars to employ tens of thousands of “civic engagement coordinators” can dominate low turnout elections. Nothing more, nothing less.
The GOP has to accept this instead of taking any silly lessons away like “we lost because we didn’t compromise enough””
John James did NOT attend a major Election Day MIGOP debate forum in Roseville in which Tom Leonard, Aric Nesbitt and several other hopefuls DID attend.
Nesbitt was vocal about Rep. James non-attendance.
The big victory in Michigan for Republicans was the Southfield City Clerk race in which pro-MAGA candidate Gabi Grossbard defeated two write-in challengers by netting slightly over 50% of the total vote.
The race was notable in that the Michigan Democratic Party organized a write-in effort and tried to cast Grossbard, an Israeli emigrant, as an extreme right-winger and election denier. The eelctorate did not buy the rantings of Democrats and Grossbard will be sworn in as the new Southfield City Clerk.
The Southfield City Clerk race was another disaster for the Michigan Democratic Party.
MDP chairman Curtis Hertel, Jr. underscored the importance of keeping Grossbard out of the City Clerk’s office and the MDP organized a write-in effort after the only other candidate was removed from the ballot due to invalid petition signatures.
Hertel and other Dem leaders made news in making statements suggesting that Grossbard, a Republican who previously ran for U.S. Congress, was a right-wing extremist.
The Democrats had ZERO chance at defeating Grossbard when two Democrats filed as write-in candidates and effectively split the overall vote against Grossbard. Even though Grossbard barely received a majority – any chance at blocking Grossbard were ruined by the fact two candidates were splitting the anti-Grossbard vote.
Most Southfield voters were puzzled why the MDP would concern itself with a local city clerk race – a largely administrative position.
The Michigan Democratic Party had mobilized a small army of volunteers to knock on thousands of doors to communicate to Southfield residents to support Wynette Guy, a Southfield City Clerk’s office employee, who had been disqualified from the ballot by the Michigan Board of Canvassers from that City Clerk’s race.
Ms. Guy, a U.S. navy veteran, had campaigned extensively launched attack videos suggesting that Grossbard had previously sued to overturn the 2020 election along with other Trump supporters and was therefore not fit to serve as city clerk.
Grossbard’s volunteers countered that Democrats were trying to pit Southfield’s black voters against a Jewish candidate. They also pointed out and argued the history of incompetence in the office of Southfield City Clerk justified a better leader than Ms. Guy.
The race in question was reported on nationally and internationally.
Manuela Garza says
(Edit)Does John James really plan to run for Michigan governor? There is debate as to his actual intentions. Both inside the GOP and among Democrats.
If he does it is an interesting strategy – he finished poorly in the Mackinac straw poll. His non-appearances at Republican candidate functions is puzzling.
Anonymous says
(Edit)GREAT