Detroit is the largest city in Michigan and has a long history of political involvement. The Detroit City Council is responsible for making decisions related to budgeting, taxation, zoning, land use, public amenities, and other aspects of governing the city. Detroit has elected a mayor and nine council members since 1824. In addition to the mayor and council members, Detroit also elects two representatives to the Michigan House of Representatives and one representative to the United States Congress. Each representative is chosen from their respective districts in Detroit. Political issues in Detroit are often contentious due to its large population and diverse cultural background – particularly when it comes to topics like economic development, public transportation, crime prevention, poverty reduction, environmental protection, and education reform. Political leaders must be willing to work together in order to solve the complex problems facing Detroit’s citizens while also ensuring that their interests are represented fairly at both local and national levels.
The political climate in Detroit, MI is very liberal.
Wayne County, MI is very liberal. In Wayne County, MI 68.3% of the people voted Democrat in the last presidential election, 30.3% voted for the Republican Party, and the remaining 1.4% voted Independent.
In the last Presidential election, Wayne county remained overwhelmingly Democratic, 68.3% to 30.3%.
Wayne county voted Democratic in every Presidential election since 2000.
The BestPlaces liberal/conservative index
Detroit, MI is very liberal.
Wayne County, Michigan is very liberal.
Detroit-Warren-Dearborn Metro Area is somewhat liberal.
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.
Detroit, Michigan: D D D D D 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 if the Democratic Party candidate won and I if the Independent Party candidate won. The six elections (2000, 2004, 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020) would be expressed as six-letter word (R R D 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. 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 three elections.
Individual Campaign Contributions in Detroit, MI
In the last 4 years (2018-2021), there were 44,687 contributions totaling $8,380,214 to the Democratic Party and liberal campaigns, averaging $188 per contribution.
In the last 4 years, there were 3,185 contributions totaling $5,689,349 to the Republican Party and conservative campaigns, averaging $1,786 per contribution.
(source: Federal Election Commission)