Michigan Republicans haven’t had a better shot to win the governorship in over a decade. Deciding who should take it is turning into an ugly, hyper-online brawl.
With widespread name recognition and an endorsement from President Donald Trump, Rep. John James appears poised to be the GOP nominee ahead of Michigan’s primary Tuesday.
But the West Point graduate once thought of as a rising star within the national GOP is facing stiff resistance from an outspoken grassroots wing of the state party, which is rallying around his sole remaining competitor.
“I think you're gonna be surprised when this race comes down,” said Oakland County GOP Chair Vance Patrick, who endorsed businessperson-turned-outsider candidate Perry Johnson in the closing weeks of the race. “It's getting really interesting.”
As James and Johnson careen toward a contest to decide who faces likely Democratic nominee and current Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, the campaigning is getting weird. Johnson has launched increasingly caustic and personal attacks against James, who has led the field since he entered the race.
And Johnson cuts an odd figure for a leading contender: He is perhaps best known for his quixotic 2024 presidential bid, which came after a 2022 gubernatorial campaign fell apart amid a nominating petition scandal.
But state party officials and grassroots activists have also shared publicly and privately a litany of complaints about James: resentment over too many debates missed early on in the campaign, not enough visits to specific parts of the state, frustration over him giving away a battleground House seat Democrats are targeting this cycle to run for a new job after losing two previous statewide elections.
Nonetheless, even his detractors insist that Republican voters will rally around the eventual nominee. Patrick, whose county party — which includes parts of metro Detroit that fall within James’ district — received $13,350 from the Johnson campaign, said Republicans “will join lockstep behind the guy that wins the primary.”
The intra-party consternation comes at a pivotal moment for Michigan Republicans, who’ve watched eight years of Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s leadership — and yawning statewide victories — with disdain.
Meanwhile, Democrats appear ready to elevate Benson, who has built a $6.4 million war chest as of mid-July — albeit dwarfed by Johnson’s personal wealth — thanks to a prolific fundraising advantage. The secretary of state appears to be en route to easily beat Genesee County Sheriff Chris Swanson for the nomination.
And Trump winning the state in 2024 is no assurance for Republicans, who saw their Senate candidate falter to now-Sen. Elissa Slotkin in the same year. Now, the GOP is facing an uphill battle amid rising gas prices brought on by a deeply unpopular war in Iran that is causing headaches for the party nationwide.
Finding a nominee who can win over independents and compete in the mother of all swing states is paramount, some Republicans say, and they’re not sure James is it.
“There’s a large amount of Republicans that do not like him,” said Hassan Nehme, a former vice chair of the Michigan GOP and current candidate for state Legislature, referring to some voters’ hesitance about James’ voting record.
The Johnson campaign has launched vitriolic personal attacks at James throughout the race. Johnson, who is white, has referred to James, one of the few Black Republicans in Congress and the sole Black candidate in the race, as a “DEI candidate,” and accused him of playing the “race card” during a recent debate. James, in turn, has characterized Johnson as “desperate.”
The campaign has also turned to promoting an unsubstantiated rumor, while providing no evidence, about James’ personal life, reposting social media posts that attack James.
Tori Sachs, a senior adviser for the James campaign, characterized Johnson’s attacks in a statement as “lies” that are exposing “a desperate, career candidate who has no grasp on reality and no friends that he didn’t buy.”
"Never-Trumper Perry Johnson has burned through over $70 million attacking Trump and James with lies, only to crash toward his third loss in three cycles,” she said.
Such plays are emblematic of Johnson’s campaign strategy, which has leaned heavily online and embraced a constituency of right-leaning grassroots organizers. On social media, he’s employed artificial intelligence to construct sometimes bizarre ads, including a six-minute long odyssey in which he doggedly pursues James on foot, bus and helicopter in order to debate him.
Brian Szmytke, a campaign spokesperson for the Johnson campaign, reiterated in a statement that “John James is unelectable in a general election,” listing several attacks levied during the campaign.
The scrappy turn in the campaign intensified when former state Attorney General Mike Cox, who was also courting voters skeptical of the GOP establishment, dropped out of the race in mid-July. But even before then, Republican officials across the state had expressed doubts about James.
That the Johnson campaign has attacked James on such personal terms points to the campaign’s dire straits, said John Sellek, a Michigan-based Republican political consultant.
“We’ve turned a corner since Cox got out, where the Perry Johnson campaign has been throwing haymakers on what look like less than prime issues because they know the end is here,” Sellek said.
That’s all despite a huge spending advantage for the self-funding Johnson.
He has spent over $32 million getting on the airwaves, while James’ campaign has spent $2.4 million, according to advertising insight firm AdImpact.
“All the typical support mechanisms are moving toward James, even though he is being wildly outspent,” said Sellek.
Before appearing in a set of televised debates held in July, James had abstained from participating in several debates held earlier in the primary. James at the time defended skipping the events, saying he was more focused on uniting the party than bickering with candidates. But some voters took his absence as a sign of disengagement from the grassroots.
Daire Rendon — the Republican Party chair for Michigan’s 1st District, which covers the entire Upper Peninsula and swaths of northern Michigan — suggested that James doesn’t connect with voters in her rural region.
Rendon, a former state representative who was charged for her alleged involvement in a scheme to unlawfully access voting machines after the 2020 election, noted that “we don’t see John James much.”
“They are going to gravitate towards candidates who spend time learning about [the Upper Peninsula], and who show up,” said Rendon, who pleaded not guilty and whose case is ongoing.
Detractors have also criticized James for running for governor in the first place, viewing the contested House seat he’s leaving behind as more valuable amid the GOP’s slim majority and as Republicans stare down an unfavorable midterm cycle. Trump also initially took issue with his gubernatorial ambitions, grousing about it publicly, before endorsing him in June.
“You don't blow off 80 million in an investment to get you elected to Congress, and in one term leave,” said Muskegon County GOP Chair Tim Cross. (James was first elected to the House in 2022.)
James, however, also appears to have a slew of grassroots support himself. Several Michigan Republicans touted James in interviews with POLITICO, including former state legislator and Macomb County Prosecutor Peter Lucido, who said James is “a proven leader, and he’s gonna continue to go ahead and govern and lead.”
Public and private polling appears to indicate that James remains comfortably in the lead. An internal poll, shared with POLITICO, of more than 700 likely primary voters conducted for the Cox campaign in the days before he dropped out in mid-July showed James leading with 36 percent points, with Johnson trailing at 23 percent and Cox at 21 percent.
Likely Cox voters split for Johnson over James as their second choice, 44 percent to 38 percent respectively.
James, the Cox campaign wrote in a memo to donors and supporters attached to the polling, “benefited by hundreds of millions of dollars targeted toward voters, specifically in Southeast Michigan, over the past several election cycles, coupled with the endorsement of President Donald Trump, creating a scenario where James’ lead is largely insulated.”
Now, the James campaign is rolling out its line of endorsements ranging from state representatives, senators and conservative activists, with Trump’s endorsement as a crown jewel.
The president brought James on stage at a late July rally outside Detroit, where the candidate asserted, falsely, for the first time that Trump won Michigan in 2020. James had previously said that Joe Biden won the 2020 election, though he said earlier this cycle that he was “screwed” that year when he lost his Senate bid.
“You have to win,” the president told James onstage Monday. “You have to win.”