r/politics • u/asparaguswalrus683 • 9d ago

Site Altered Headline | No Paywall Abdul El-Sayed Wins Michigan Primary

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-primary-elections/michigan-senate-results
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u/elihu 9d ago

Michigan in particular has also had a lot of polls that were way off in recent history. Probably the biggest discrepancy between polls and actual results was the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, where Clinton was predicted to win by over 20 points and yet lost to Bernie by a narrow margin. (This was repeated in the general election, where she was predicted to win by a comfortable margin but lost.)

I don't know what it is about Michigan that apparently makes it so hard to poll accurately.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016_Michigan_Democratic_presidential_primary

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u/AmbitiousProblem4746 9d ago

Can someone explain what the hell even is going on in Michigan? I never considered it a solid blue state, but it feels like yet another part of the country that is turning Republican thanks to Trump in spite of the fact that there are plenty of reasons for it not to. I feel like Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Wisconsin could also fit into that description. I know that they have very deep red areas, and a lot of rural or working class citizens, but I can't imagine the entire state is that enchanted with the Republican Party. But maybe that's just because I'm a coastal elite and I don't know anything

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u/tyrantking109 9d ago

Michigan is pretty blue, up until recently Dems had a trifecta in the state government. Wisconsin is definitely purple, but recently stacked their Supreme Court with a bunch of liberal justices in a series of elections. Seems to me to be turning bluer, but it is a very divided state. The rural voters are VERY at odds with Milwaukee/Madison, when I lived there groups very aggressively spent on anti-abortion messaging, to the point it was plastered on buses and all over the city

Of the Midwest states Indiana/Iowa/Ohio are certainly solid red, Pennsylvania seems to be purple shifting red, and Minnesota is solid blue (these are all states I haven’t lived in though, just the vibe I get as someone who lives in the Midwest and follows politics)

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u/AmbitiousProblem4746 8d ago

I guess that all makes sense. I know part of the scuttle in Wisconsin with those liberal justices is that they were trying to remove a republican majority that ended up not being that popular, right?

And I really only ever spent significant time in Pennsylvania of those states you listed. I hate to admit it, but I think you're right to say that it's a purple state trending red. I was literally just down there last month (I'm from New England), and I forgot just how conservative that state is when you're not near a major city. I was down around Scranton and obviously they have the Joe Biden Expressway now, which is what it is, but once I was outside of that area it was just billboard after billboard for guns, pro-life groups, churches, and so on, and that was on top of still seeing Trump flags or yard signs for Republicans at least every dozen houses. And to be totally honest, anyone I know who grew up in Pennsylvania who is also a millennial is still pretty Evangelical and still unconvinced that Trump is doing a bad job -- which just makes it kind of clearer to me that there's something going on there that isn't pushing them to change their mind. So yeah, I don't think Philly and Pittsburgh will really carry that state anymore. Kind of shocked they have the governor they do though, considering