It’s All About Cars In The Great Lakes State… And It’s Not Going Well

Jobs are getting shipped off, headquarters are shrinking, and Michigan’s auto workers aren’t happy with the status quo

By Charlie LeDuff

Dearborn — Parachute artists from the out-of-town press corps have landed.

It’s that time in the political cycle when they all drop into Michigan to inspect us like so many zoo animals.

They’ve been calling me. Their question—without variation—is this: How will Dearborn vote? Their presumption is that if Muslims stay home, then Kamala Harris is doomed.

While every person and every vote matters, Dearborn as a voting bloc matters little in the Mother of All Swing States.

I explain it to our friends in the media like this: Michigan has 8.4 million registered voters but only 7.9 million adults. I know. I know. There are lawsuits.

Having said that, let’s assume every adult is registered to vote here in Michigan, even if they are not eligible to vote by law.

The assumption is that Dearborn’s Muslims are going to stay home in protest of the Biden-Harris administration’s impotent response to Middle Eastern events, and that may be enough to swing things Trump’s way.

While it is true that Dearborn is home to the largest concentration of Muslims per capita in the U.S., Muslims constitute about 1% of adults in Michigan. And Dearborn is home to just 77,000 people of voting age, whether they be Muslim, Christian, Arab, White, or African American. That’s less than 1% of Michigan voters.

Meanwhile, college students in Michigan combined constitute 5% of all possible voters. A Harvard poll shows young people’s top concerns are inflation, healthcare, and housing.

After filming the mosque, I encourage my out-of-town colleagues to look southerly across Ford Road and the Southfield Freeway. Dearborn is also home to the world headquarters of the Ford Motor Company.

Workers in the automotive industry constitute nearly 15% of possible voters in Michigan. About 1.1 million people in Michigan earn their bread from cars, trucks, and other “mobility platforms.” The rest of us depend on their paychecks to float our hamburger stands, shoe stores, and government sinecures.

Cars. Jobs. Grocery bills. That’s where the election will be decided in Michigan.

Now consider that Ford is losing $50,000 per electric vehicle. Executives at the Blue Oval announced last year that they were bouncing 8,000 salaried employees to fund failing EV operations. Those were mostly expensive workers from Michigan. At the same time, Ford planned to expand its tech hub in India by 3,000 cheaper workers.

Read Charlie's entire column at: https://enjoyer.com/forget-dearborn-cars-will-drive-michigans-election/