The Detroit News, which clings to the pretense that it’s Michigan’s conservative voice, has not endorsed the Republican candidate for president in 15 years.
Fine by me. I don’t read the paper, anyhow. I canceled it years ago. Most people have.
But occasionally the paper publishes something that makes its way around and gets repeated often enough that it becomes the consensus.
Things like political polls.
Richard Czuba, founder of the Glengariff Group, is the pollster for both The News and WDIV. They quote him in print. They interview him on TV. The governor’s race is too close to call! Mike Duggan is a kingmaker in the U.S. Senate race! The governor's race is deadlocked!
What the paper hasn’t told you is that Czuba is the subject of a criminal referral—drafted by Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, no less—accused of raising and laundering more than $750,000 into the campaign coffers of a 2020 gay rights campaign co-chaired by Alanna Maguire.
It is no small detail that Maguire is the wife of Attorney General Dana Nessel, a hyper-partisan Democrat. For her part, Nessel stands accused by the Michigan House Oversight Committee of tanking that investigation into Czuba and her own wife. Nessel herself will soon face impeachment charges by the House of Representatives.
To this day, the paper’s political writers have not disclosed the incestuous affair to the public.
Czuba, it is alleged, was the paid middle-man who collected dark money from DTE’s political arm and funneled it to Maguire’s campaign. Instead of divulging his name, the paper uses the name of Czuba’s now-defunct advocacy organization, Bipartisan Solutions.
Would somebody please explain to me what is “bipartisan” about a pollster raising money for some of the most powerful and most connected Democrats in the state?
Meanwhile, The News has spilled barrels of ink on a similar story.A conservative group, Unlock Michigan, pushed a ballot initiative back in 2020 looking to repeal Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s emergency Covid powers.
People involved with raising money for that initiative were criminally referred by Benson to Nessel, accused of laundering dark money in order to conceal donor identities.
Nessel brought criminal charges on that one, which carry up to 14 years in prison and potentially millions of dollars in fines. That case is ongoing, and The News can’t get enough of it.
But the case of the Attorney General, her wife and their “non-partisan” pollster?
Crickets.
I don’t know. Sounds like a story to me.
But there’s another question: Is Czuba is even good at polling?
I called him to ask.
Again, crickets.
But there is this: The News published a Glengariff poll just a week before the 2024 election. Czuba had Kamala Harris beating Donald Trump by 3% (Trump, in fact, beat Harris by 1.4%). In the Michigan senate race, Czuba had Elissa Slotkin beating Mike Rogers by 4.5% (Slotkin beat Rogers by 0.3%). Both results were outside the poll’s margin of error.
Toilet paper.Did Czuba’s poll sway voter turnout? Not likely, since almost no one reads The News.
Still, it’s farcical when you know what’s going on under the sheets.
If you want to cancel your subscription to The Detroit News, it is easiest to cancel your credit card to avoid the financial loop the newspaper puts you through.
And if you want real news, subscribe to our newsletter. Still 100% free.Charlie LeDuff is a reporter educated in public schools. Follow him on X @Charlieleduff.
