Any Michigander that has turned on the TV, watched a YouTube video, or opened a social media platform in the last month has likely been unable to do so without watching several out-of-context, poorly-edited sound bites from Michigan gubernatorial candidate Tudor Dixon.
The ads, with the aid of a menacing voiceover, detail Dixon’s stance on abortion using “her own words.” One such commercial, which points out her ‘no exceptions’ position, is highlighted by a clip where Dixon is asked “a 14-year-old who, let’s say, is the victim of abuse by an uncle. You’re saying carry that?” to which she responds “Perfect example.”
After a statement released by Dixon’s campaign saying the answer was taken out of context, the interviewer, Charlie LeDuff, posted Dixon’s full answer where she clarifies her feeling that “a life is a life.”
Few, however, know the candidate behind the ads. Dixon is a breast cancer survivor and working mother of four. She made her career in the steel industry before transitioning into conservative news media. Like nearly all of her Republican counterparts in Michigan, she sought her nomination because of a distrust and dislike of Whitmer’s policies, and especially her COVID shutdowns.
During this year’s midterms, few public officials deserve to be booted from office more than Whitmer does. She won election four years ago by promising to “fix the damn roads.” Yet she has done no such thing. The Michigan Transportation Asset Management Council, a state agency, says that the share of roads in “good” condition has risen from 21 percent to 26 percent, but that 32 percent are in “poor” condition and that this rate will soar to 48 percent in the next 10 years. All Whitmer has done, it would seem, is fill a few potholes. She’s fixed almost nothing.
During COVID, Whitmer forced businesses and schools across the state to close. While many other governors did the same, Whitmer was the worst in the nation. Nearly one-third of Michigan businesses shuttered at least temporarily, compared to a national average of about 19 percent. Not only that, but Whitmer violated her own lockdowns.
Her school closures devastated students, as test scores on math and reading dropped dramatically, according to the latest findings of the National Assessment of Student Progress, the so-called “nation’s report card.” Michigan’s fourth graders, in fact, recorded their worst reading scores in 30 years.
Bolstering Michigan’s economy, defending second amendment rights, and – of course – her hardline pro life stance round out Dixon into a candidate built to ride the Conservative Populist Movement that has commanded the nation’s attention in recent years.
For Michigan conservatives who have spent the better part of the last four years shaking their fists at every one of Whitmer’s COVID regulations or failed spending bills, a vote for Dixon represents their first legitimate chance to right the ship.
To read opposing view, click here.
