Animosity toward Trump could elect record number of women in Michigan

Michigan women are ready to show the nation that the Women’s March that happened 22 months ago was the beginning, not the end, of a historic change in America’s political landscape.

“Michigan is poised to elect some of the biggest numbers of women in the state’s history,” reports the Detroit Free Press.

Led at the top of the ticket by Gretchen Whitmer, who’s running for governor, and including women like Mari Manoogian, who’s running for the state House of Representatives, Democratic women are leading the way toward historic gains at the state level.

“Most of the increased number of women on the ballot are Democrats: eight in the U.S. House of Representatives compared with two Republicans; 17 in the state Senate compared with 10 GOP women, and 58 in the state House, compared with 34 Republicans,” reports the Free Press.

Strong Democratic candidates up and down the ballot are buoyed by a deeply unpopular Trump, who is dragging down Republican nominees throughout the state.

One statewide poll shows barely 1 in 3 Michiganders approve of Trump’s job performance, while a solid majority of 57 percent disapprove.

Trump’s unpopularity “is what’s driving voters in every single race right now,” said Richard Czuba, the man who conducted the poll.

The Associated Press points to pivotal Oakland County as a bellwether area to keep an eye on.

“Democrats are especially enthusiastic about their chances to take Republican-leaning seats in suburban Detroit’s Oakland County and western Wayne County — where college-educated, more affluent women may be turned off by President Donald Trump,” the AP reports. “Whitmer is poised to do well in bellwether Oakland, which also has two major congressional races, and Democrats are running female candidates in all eight legislative seats considered to be competitive there.”

One of the marquee matchups in Oakland County is between Manoogian, mentioned earlier, and Republican David Wolkinson. Both are running for an open seat previously held by a Republican.

Wolkinson is an unabashed supporter of Trump, praising Trump for his “bold, no-nonsense approach,” in Washington, D.C. Part of Trump’s “approach,” as Wolkinson put it, is coddling a violent mob of Nazis in Charlottesville, and later implementing a policy to tear thousands of immigrant children away from their parents.

Manoogian is a 31-year old former State Department employee who is focusing her campaign on education, roads, and the economy.

The Democrats need to pick up nine seats in the House in order to regain control of that chamber.

If women like Manoogian can win in traditionally conservative areas of the state, Michigan’s own blue wave will see a record-setting number of women in elected office.