A group of 22 Republican state lawmakers sent a letter Thursday asking the U.S. Department of Justice to supervise Michigan’s elections next year.
The letter escalates ongoing tension between legislative Republicans and Democratic Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson over the conduct of past and future elections in Michigan.
The letter addressed to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, an appointee of President Donald Trump, argues that Benson will be supervising one or more elections where she will also be a candidate as she seeks the Democratic nomination for governor.
“This creates an inherent and unavoidable conflict of interest, as Secretary Benson will be administering an election in which she has a direct personal stake in the outcome,” says the letter. “Such a situation risks compromising the impartiality required for fair election oversight and demands external federal scrutiny to maintain public trust.”
The letter also attacks Benson’s management of elections and maintaining voter rolls. She and her office have been the target of subpoenas from the GOP-led House Oversight Committee.
It is not unusual for Michigan secretaries of state to have a hand in elections where they appear on the ballot. Benson, for example, supervised the election where she won her second term.
Her Republican predecessor, Ruth Johnson, was in charge of elections when she won her second term as secretary of state and her first term in the Michigan Senate. Johnson (R-Groveland Township) is one the signers of the letter to the DOJ.
Benson’s communications director said Michigan elections are safeguarded by a system that relies heavily on 1,600 local clerks of both major political parties as well as thousands of observers, including federal monitors.
“Yet by pouring gasoline on our democracy and asking the DOJ to light a match, these lawmakers ignore these truths,” said Benson Chief Communications Officer Angela Benander in email to Michigan Public Radio.
“They instead use dangerous, false rhetoric to encourage President Trump to illegally interfere in our state’s ability to hold fair and free elections,” she continued. “They are aligning with the administration’s ongoing efforts to manufacture crises in order to justify ongoing federal overreach that puts our citizens’ privacy, safety, and freedoms in danger.
A Department of Justice spokesperson replied “no comment” when asked about the Michigan GOP request.
The stakes next year in Michigan will be unusually high with open seats for governor, attorney general, secretary of state, and U.S. Senate on the ballot, as well as elections for the U.S. House and all 148 seats in the Legislature.
