UNDATED (WKZO-AM) — The last-minute push is on and it appears that both the Clinton and Trump campaigns think that victory may depend on the outcome in Michigan, and particularly west Michigan.
It has been announced that both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump will be in West Michigan on Monday. Clinton will hold a rally at the Grand Valley State University fieldhouse in Allendale at 4 p.m. Trump will make his last campaign appearence at 11 p.m. at DeVos Place in Grand Rapids.
That will follow visits on Sunday by Bill Clinton at Flint churchdes and at a United Auto Workers hall in Lansing and Sarah Palin who made stops at Trump campaign headquarters across eastern Michigan. the day of events concluded with a speech by Trump himself at a stop in Sterling Heights on Sunday.
Monday really gets busy. Besides the visits from the two nominees, President Barack Obama will be making an 11 a.m. appearance in Ann Arbor. Ivanka Trump, Donald Trump’s daughter, is scheduled for a private event with Republican women in Hudsonville at 11 a.m. Republican vice-presidential nominee Mike Pence will be in Traverse City at 1 p.m. Monday.
Michigan hasn’t gone with a Republican for President since Gerald Ford, a favorite son.
“Michigan has voted reliably democratic for the last several presidential elections, but the Clinton campaign is spending an awful lot of time in a state that is supposed to be pretty secure for her,” Western Michigan University Political Science Professor Peter Weilhouwer said.
Weilhouwer said the Republicans haven’t been taking the state for granted either with multiple visits by both Trump and Pence in recent days, and surrogates from both camps popping up on a daily basis.
“Both sides, aided by the Republican National Committee and the Democratic National Committee, are looking at their own internal polling and it’s telling them that Michigan is a place that each side has a chance to mine more votes,” Grand Valley State University Political Science Professor Erika King told CBS News.
The Detroit News says the Clinton Campaign is shoring up support in the upper Midwest and countering the Trump strategy, which the newspaper describes as a “hail mary.”
CBS political analyst John Dickerson thinks that Trump is taking a big risk focusing so much time in Michigan and Minnesota in this final push, when there are other state’s where the polls are closer, that his campaign would benefit from more attention.
