Michigan is an important state in the United States, and it has a vibrant political landscape with many different candidates vying for various elected positions. At the federal level, Michigan is represented by two United States Senators and fourteen members of the U.S. House of Representatives. At the state level, there are 38 seats in the Michigan Senate and 110 seats in the Michigan House of Representatives. A wide variety of candidates from both major parties as well as third-party options compete for these offices each election cycle. Additionally, each county in Michigan has its own local elected representatives, further providing residents with numerous choices when voting on Election Day. The political climate in Michigan is quite active, and voters have a variety of choices when deciding who to vote for during any given election cycle.
The political climate in Michigan is leaning liberal.
In Michigan 50.5% of the people voted for the Democratic Party in the last presidential election, 47.8% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.7% voted for an Independent Party.
In the last Presidential election, Michigan flipped Democratic, 50.5% to 47.8%.
Michigan flipped back Democratic in the most recent Presidential election, voting Democratic in five of the last six elections.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Michigan is leaning liberal.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index is based on recent voting in national elections, federal campaign contributions by local residents, and consumer personality profiles.
VoteWord™
Displaying 20 years of Presidential voting, visualized in one word.
Michigan, Michigan: d d D d r d
How It Works:
Here at BestPlaces, we were looking at the voting patterns since the 2000 election and realized that we could express the results of each election as one letter. R if the Republican Party candidate won, D for the Democrat and I for the Independent. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D R R R).
Then we went a little further and added the dimension of magnitude. If the difference of victory was greater than 10 percent, the letter is upper case, and lower case if the difference was less than 10 percent. This allows us to see interesting voting patterns at just a glance.
Here's the VoteWord for Iowa d r d d r r. In the last six elections the state has been closely contested, voting narrowly for the Republican Party candidate in 2016 and 2020 after voting for the Democratic Party in 2008 and 2012. Virginia (r r d d d D) has voted for the Democratic Party in the last four elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in Michigan
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 518,101 contributions totaling $70,030,108 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $135 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 96,876 contributions totaling $67,737,876 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $699 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)