News

Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson says it may take a few days to know all the results of Tuesday's election – but it appears polling places were safe and well managed.

Benson said counting absentee votes will take longer than usual, but the system was able to handle the large number of ballots that were mailed in or dropped off.

“And what that shows us is what to expect when you’ve got 1.6 to two million ballots sent through the mail. This is what the system can provide. In November, we will have potentially as many as three million sent through the mail.”

Peter Meijer, an Iraq war veteran and heir to a multibillion dollar fortune, has won the Republican primary for Michigan’s 3rd Congressional District.

Meijer declared victory around 10:30 p.m. Tuesday night, after early results showed him with a substantial lead over the other four Republicans running in the race. As of late Tuesday evening, Meijer had 49.7% of the votes, with more than two third of precincts in the district reporting. The next closest challenger was state Rep. Lynn Afendoulis, with 24.5% of votes at the time.

A company that owns two mid-Michigan dams that failed in May has filed for bankruptcy. The filings were made in the federal court in the Eastern District of Michigan.

The Michigan Farm Bureau has some concerns about a state emergency order that agricultural and food processing workers get tested for COVID-19.

The Michigan Department of Health and Human Services issued an emergency order on Monday.

After three years at the helm of Ford Motor Company, CEO Jim Hackett is retiring.

He will hand leadership of the 117-year-old car manufacturer to Jim Farley, Ford's current Chief Operating Officer, as of October 1st, 2020.

Farley assumes the top job at Ford in the middle of its effort to restructure its global operations and cut costs. 

Former Michigan State University gymnastics coach, Kathie Klages, will serve 90 days in jail and 18 months probation for lying to authorities investigating the sexual assaults committed by Larry Nassar.

That sentence was handed down Tuesday by an Ingham County Circuit Court judge.

Voting is light at many of the polling places across Michigan. Primary elections generally don’t pull as many voters. Also this year no-reason absentee voting has also contributed to a light turnout. Many people did not want to potentially expose themselves to the coronavirus.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer's executive order that placed a statewide moratorium on evictions lapsed on July 16th.  

A week later, federal unemployment payments of $600 a week ran out, after members of Congress failed to renew the benefits.

An undocumented Albanian man who’s been living in sanctuary in a Detroit church to avoid deportation has an important hearing this week.

Ded Rranxburgaj came to the U.S. with his family illegally in 2001, in hopes of claiming political asylum. Advocates say they’ve tried every legal way they could to stay in the U.S, but the Trump administration moved to deport Rranxburgaj in 2018.

Michigan’s new PFAS drinking water standards went into effect this week. The restrictions include seven more common chemicals from the PFAS family. Michigan's regulations are among the strictest in the U.S.

Liesl Clark is the Director of the Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy. She says the state continues to search for the sources of the toxic chemicals in the state. Recently 38 new contaminated sites were identified.

Owen Bondono, Michigan’s newly named Teacher of the Year and a ninth-grade English language arts teacher at Oak Park Freshman Institute, works to create a classroom community in which students feel comfortable sharing their experiences and ideas with eachother. But as a fall semester unlike any other approaches, and some schools lean toward virtual learning to limit the spread of COVID-19, Bondono is having to rethink the way he conducts meaningful class conversations with his students.

The state House and state Senate have canceled plans for in-person meetings this week in Lansing. That’s after a Republican lawmaker tested positive for COVID-19. Senator Tom Barrett (R-Charlotte) said he’s not experiencing significant symptoms, but is self-isolating. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has taken a toll on Political Action Committees relied on by many state lawmakers.

The Michigan Campaign Finance Network reports during the governor’s stay-at-home order, state House members' PACs saw a steep drop in campaign donations.

Some Detroit residents and environmental justice groups have filed a civil rights complaint against the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy. The complaint alleges the environment agency discriminates against people of color by approving requests for hazardous wastes sites near their communities.

Federal investigators continue to investigate a racketeering scheme in Ohio. The plan was to increase electric rates to subsidize two aging nuclear power plants situated along Lake Erie owned by First Energy. One of the nuclear power plants is Davis-Besse, just 20 miles from the Michigan border. It’s a problem-plagued plant according to regulators.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer has vetoed a bill that would have had serious implications for nursing home residents recovering from COVID-19. 

Senator Peter Lucido (R-Shelby Charter Township) was the bill’s sponsor. He’s says that the governor’s policy of placing recovering COVID patients in so-called regional hubs has resulted in loss of lives. 

The Detroit Public Schools Community District wants parent input about how their students will be learning in the fall.

DPSCD is offering both fully virtual and face-to-face instruction. District officials say they want a parent feedback survey completed by August 4, though the “drop-dead deadline” for responses is August 21.

The State of Michigan hopes a new initiative will reduce its growing Hepatitus C treatment costs for state prison inmates and people with Medicaid and Healthy Michigan Plan insurance. 

Chronic Hepatitis C is a serious liver infection that can result in cirrhosis or cancer. 

Your vote won’t count even if your ballot is postmarked by Election Day. The Michigan Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal arguing for that.

Instead your ballot must arrive at the clerk’s office by 8:00 p.m. Election Day to be counted.

An Oakland County teenager at the center of a controversial court case will soon be heading home.

She’s identified only as “Grace.” 

A judge sent the 15 year old to the Oakland County Children's Village back in May, after she violated her probation on assault and theft charges. The violation?  Not doing her school work.

Several University of Michigan top officials, including former President Mary Sue Coleman, were alerted to sexual misconduct allegations against former Provost Martin Philbert, but ultimately failed to prevent him from sexually harassing and intimidating subordinates and student-employees for more than a decade.

That’s the damning conclusion of a report released Friday by WilmerHale, the firm hired by the U of M in January to conduct an investigation into complaints against Philbert.

This is family vacation time for me, so in order to fully appreciate and benefit from the "not working" part of what a vacation is actually supposed to be (a bit of a foreign concept to most of us Americans, I know), I drew this cartoon a week ago. That's always a challenge — picking some topic that can remain relevant (heck, even recognizable) when news cycles continue to accelerate toward warp speed.

Some school districts have already announced they'll be offering remote instruction only in the fall, over concerns it is not safe for teachers, staff, students or their families to have in-person instruction, due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel’s office will not appeal a court decision which would allow a tunnel to be constructed beneath the Straits of Mackinac to house a replacement for the aging Enbridge Line 5 twin pipelines.

The tunnel was supported by former Governor Rick Snyder and the Republican led legislature to house a replacement for the aging twin pipelines called Line 5 operated by Enbridge.