MI-GOV: Republican Governors Association pulling money out of the Michigan race
As the Michigan race for governor heats up in the final nine weeks of the campaign season, the Republican Governor’s Association is shifting $1.5 million in advertising money away from key voting markets in the race.
The RGA still has reserved $5.6 million in advertising time around the state through Nov. 6, but has shifted $1.5 million from TV spending in metro Detroit and Grand Rapids, the two largest population — and voting — centers in the state.
JonThompson, spokesman for the RGA, said the advertising buys were made in the early summer before the Aug. 7 primary election whittled the number of candidates down to Republican Bill Schuette, the attorney general from Midland, and Democrat Gretchen Whitmer, the former Senate minority leader from East Lansing.
“We’re going to keep playing in the race to see what kind of impact we can make,” Thompson said. “We’re doing the same thing in other states. For right now, it’s more of a shift than a pulling back.”
He also noted that the State Solutions, a political action committee affiliated with the RGA, has invested more than $1 million in the state.
Republicans said these types of changes happen all the time and aren’t a cause for concern, but Democrats said recent polling has shown Whitmer with a significant lead in the race and the GOP is probably looking to other states, like Ohio and Florida, where the race for governor is much tighter.
“I think they’re just shifting their target times around. They’re fully committed to the race,” said Republican political consultant Tom Shields, of Lansing-based MRG. “But they’ll also be watching the polling carefully.”
Mario Morrow, a Detroit-based consultant, said the shift in cash means one of two things: either the RGA thinks it doesn’t need to spend money in the large suburban areas of Michigan to win the state; or there are other races around the country that are closer.
https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/2018/09/04/republican-governors-association-advertising-michigan/1196403002/
GRETCHEN WHITMER
https://www.gretchenwhitmer.com
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