Election 2020

On Tuesday, a federal appeals court ruled a lower court erred when it told the state of Michigan exactly how to accommodate candidates trying to get on the August primary ballot.

Some state and federal candidates claimed Michigan’s stay home order prevented them from collecting enough signatures to qualify for the August ballot. 

Tuesday’s election is going to be unique in Michigan history.

As part of the effort to reduce the spread of the novel coronavirus, there will be no polling locations open for in-person voting on Election Day.

Instead, the May 5 election will be mainly handled with “mail-in” voting.

A federal judge has denied a request by the state of Michigan to stay a ruling reducing the number of signatures needed to get on the August primary ballot.

Candidates unable to collect signatures because of the governor’s Stay Home order sued and won more time for collect fewer signatures to qualify for the ballot.    The deadline had been this past Tuesday, April 21st.

But the Michigan Attorney General’s office asked the judge to reconsider the ruling, since the Republican congressional candidate who brought the lawsuit had actually met the filing deadline.

Michigan’s Attorney General is asking a federal judge to reconsider a ruling that extended the state’s filing deadline for the August primary. 

A federal judge is ordering the state of Michigan to extend the filing deadline for political candidates trying to get on the August ballot.

“These are not normal times,” U.S. District Judge Terrence Berg wrote in his order, that the state must reduce the number of required signatures by 50%, allow for the collection of electronic signatures, and extend the deadline to May 8.

Candidates for public office who say they haven’t been able to venture out and gather petition signatures because of social distancing say the state should change the candidate filing requirements, and simply extending the deadline wouldn’t be good enough. The candidate filing deadline to qualify for the August primary ballot is Tuesday.

A federal judge is promising to issue a ruling on a lawsuit challenging Michigan’s signature petition deadline for the August primary.

The deadline for candidates to submit petition signatures is April 21st.

But the governor’s Stay Home order due to the COVID-19 pandemic shut down normal petition circulation on March 23rd.

Only two candidates will be onstage for Sunday's Democratic primary debate: former Vice President Joe Biden and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. The CNN-Univision debate was relocated from Arizona to Washington, D.C., and will not have an in-person audience due to coronavirus concerns.

A resurgent Joe Biden has continued his momentum with a win in Michigan's Democratic primary, denying Bernie Sanders' attempt to rekindle his presidential campaign in what will be a presidential battleground in November.

Michigan's primary was the largest delegate prize in this week's slate of contests, in what effectively is a two-man race after Biden's big Super Tuesday wins winnowed the field.

Michigan voters headed to the polls Tuesday to weigh in the presidential primary, as well as more than 200 local ballot questions across the state. The primary is also the first statewide test of Michigan's same-day voter registration rules since voters passed Propsal 3 in 2018. 

After hearing reports of long lines of voters at Ann Arbor's City Hall, we sent a few reporters to check it out.

Requests for absentee ballots ahead of Michigan’s Presidential Primary Tuesday nearly doubled across the state when compared to the 2016 primary.

This is the first statewide election since Michigan adopted new laws allowing residents to vote absentee for any reason, and to register to vote even on Election Day.

Former Vice President Joe Biden spoke about the importance of community healthcare in his visit to Grand Rapids Monday.

With support from Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Biden says helping former President Barack Obama establish the Affordable Care Act was one of his crowning achievements as Vice President.

Flint voters on Tuesday are being asked to support a change in how their school taxes are spent.

Voters are being asked to approve extending a current millage that raises money for capital expenses. But school officials are asking voters to allow the millage to be used to pay down the district's debt more quickly.

Governor Gretchen Whitmer has endosered for Vice President Joe Biden for the Democratic presidential nomination. The endorsement comes five days before Michigan's primary.

Whitmer announced her endorsement Thursday on MSNBC's Morning Joe. "He's got my enthusiastic support and my vote on Tuesday," she said, adding, "When Michigan needed help ... Barack Obama and Joe Biden had our backs."