Michiganders’ mailboxes and televisions are stuffed to the brim with political campaign ads, which can only mean one thing: Primary season is coming.
This year’s primary election is on August 4. Before a primary, several hopefuls campaign to be their respective party’s official candidate. The primary narrows those options down to one candidate per party ahead of the general election in November.
In the Michigan state Senate race, two districts will be closely watched. Senate District 9, situated in the Oakland/Macomb suburbs north of Detroit, has become the face of Michigan’s political realignment in the last decade. It’s a competitive district that has helped decide recent statewide elections.
Meanwhile, Senate District 32 is a longtime Republican stronghold that covers much of the Lake Michigan shoreline, including Muskegon, Mason, and Oceana Counties. But in 2022, its current state senator, Republican Jon Bumstead, only won the district by 6,000 votes out of a total 115,000—so it, too, is up for grabs.
A political advocacy group for moms speaks up about Michigan
Enter Liuba Grechen Shirley. When she ran for a New York congressional seat in 2018 she was frequently asked who would watch her children while she campaigned. The inquiries made Shirley feel as though her ability to campaign and govern effectively were being scrutinized, while her male counterparts seldom received the same questions. To push back against the stigma faced by mothers in public political office, she founded Vote Mama.
Vote Mama is the first national PAC in the country that supports and endorses Democratic moms of minor children or those who are the full-time caregivers of adult children with disabilities for public office,” Kristy Pagan, Senior Political Director at Vote Mama, said.
“We primarily look for candidates who have been personally motivated or impacted to run for office because of their kids, because of the decisions that are impacting themselves and their families, and are running for a better way of life for all American families.”
In the 2024 election cycle, 70% of Vote Mama’s endorsed candidates won their elections. In 2025, that number rose to 90%. And so far in the 2026 election cycle, they’ve endorsed 170 candidates in 36 states, from school board members to the US senate.
“We’re sick of the partisan games, we’re sick of the extremism; we need to elect everyday moms to public office to make policy changes that will uplift our families,” Pagan said. “We want to make sure that we’re continuing to increase representation of moms in politics and especially Democratic moms who are bringing that lived experience and those good policy issues to the forefront.”
Vote Mama has endorsed candidates in Michigan Senate Districts 9 and 32 who, if elected, would make stark contrasts from their predecessors.
In Senate District 9, an election denier fights to keep control
Senate District 9 is currently represented by Michael Webber (R-Rochester Hills).
Webber previously served in Michigan’s House of Representatives’ 45th district. As a state representative, in 2015, Webber co-sponsored three separate bills allowing Michigan child placement agencies to “refuse to provide services if doing so conflicts with their sincerely held religious beliefs.” All three bills were signed into law. They were part of a nationwide trend of “religious freedom” legislation that supporters said protected their religious practices and critics pointed out was frequently used as a legal means to discriminate against LGBTQ+ families.
Webber also supported claims of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 US presidential election. On November 16, 2020, he co-signed a letter to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson urging a “full, independent audit” of an included list of unverified allegations of voter fraud “prior to the certification of any results.”
The letter was co-signed by 39 other Michigan Republican state senators and sowed doubt about the results of the election.
Webber is currently up for reelection but will be challenged by one of several Democrat candidates running to unseat him.
Physician, mother of three races to represent SD-09
In November, Webber may find himself facing Theresa Brooks, MD (D-Troy).
Brooks is a physician and Troy City Council member running as a Democrat whose victory would mark her debut in the state legislature. In an exclusive interview, Brooks told The ‘Gander that her political career began when she noticed how many problems existed across several levels of government. She became involved in local politics at a grassroots level before serving as precinct delegate, where she was urged by her community to run for city council.
She ran at a difficult time. Troy City Manager Brian Kischnick had just been sentenced to 30 months in prison for accepting $20,000 in bribes. Faith in local government had waned. Brooks had her work cut out for her.
“People wanted government officials that not only they felt like they could trust more, but also that listened to them,” she said. “Collectively, we did a really good job of turning the tide with that. We created an ethics ordinance and we worked on community outreach and centering our residents in our decision-making.
We really, really weighed all of our decisions, especially those that were a little bit more controversial, very heavily.”
Brooks added that, as a result, Troy citizens trust local officials more than they trust other levels of government. Being a physician has taught her the value of patients’ trust, so it’s little wonder that she prioritized re-earning her constituents’ trust once in office.
That’s not the only way her career in medicine will influence her time in politics.
“I care very deeply about healthcare and health policy,” Brooks said. “For me, the impetus for running for State Senate was when the Big Beautiful Bill passed and they made the trillion-dollar cuts to Medicaid and the Affordable Care Act and knowing just how devastating that is.
“Good government is protecting people from illnesses and diseases.”
Brooks also said that being a physician involves substantial listening, problem solving, and teamwork. When helping patients who have suffered debilitating injuries and illnesses, she collaborates with multiple specialists per patient—physical therapists, prosthetists, occupational therapists, and so on. She said this frequent teamwork and rotation of teammates will help her improve her district as a state senator.
“You have to know how to work with other people to get things done; you can’t go at it alone as a legislative body. In medicine, you do a lot of studying about different issues, different conditions and how to treat them. And in politics, you’re also kind of studying. ‘What are the issues that are facing the community; how can we make it better?’”
Brooks said she’s looking forward to bringing her medical background to the state senate to help Michiganders, especially with their healthcare needs.
“There are no other doctors, nurses, or healthcare providers at the state senate level as it currently stands,” she said. “I’m really excited about being able to bring that level of experience and background to the table because there’s no substitute. You can have lobbyists or other people that you bring in, but I think there’s no substitute to having an actual legislator at the table who understands healthcare from that perspective.”
Brooks said that working in nursing homes, hospital settings, and at her own practice has helped her understand the complex facets of healthcare. She’s tuned into the world of insurance claims and out-of-pocket fees along with patient care.
Brooks’ work in medicine and local government earned her the endorsements of Michigan Lieutenant Governor Garlin Gilchrist II, Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks, Senate Majority Whip Mallory McMorrow, and organizations including Vote Mama, Detroit Free Press, Moms Demand Action, and The Detroit News.
When asked about her endorsements, “humbled” was the first word that came to mind.
“I feel very thankful that they have endorsed me and I appreciate their support incredibly,” Brooks said. “You can’t do it alone. These elections are not about any individual person; it’s about what you represent. It’s about wanting positive things and I’m just that vehicle to try to achieve that for a larger collective unit.”
Republican stronghold Senate District 32 finds itself up for grabs
State Senator Jon Bumstead (R-Newaygo) serves Michigan Senate District 32 and is ineligible for reelection due to term limits. The district is reliably Republican, but Bumstead’s turbulent tenure may disenfranchise constituents looking for a major change.
In November 2022, state and local news outlets reported that Bumstead was under criminal investigation for forging absentee ballots in 2016. The case against him doesn’t seem to have had any updates since its announcement.
Since that alleged incident, Bumstead was also named in documents released by the January 6, 2021, committee. He had initially been mentioned as one of many Michigan lawmakers who had been approached by President Trump’s campaign in December 2020 to support Trump’s plan to install alternate electors, but later revelations showed that Bumstead had agreed to the “fake elector plan.”
Bumstead co-signed the election audit letter to Secretary of State Benson alongside Webber. Furthermore, his 2022 victory was by a far smaller margin than expected—he won just 6,000 more votes out of 110,000 than his opponent, Terry Sabo (D).
If these actions have caused SD-32’s constituents to sour on Republicans altogether, the district may flip blue in November.
Working-class mom aims for improved childcare, bipartisanship in SD-32
Rebecca Amidon lives in the rural Manistee National Forest area with her husband and their two children. They keep chickens in a coop whose roof is made of old political yard signs; their feed scoop is an old milk jug. Despite Rebecca and her husband working, the Amidon family still had to rely on Medicaid and WIC support.
She’s also the sole Democrat candidate running to replace Bumstead. As the only Democrat candidate, she doesn’t have to participate in August’s primary, but she will be on the ballot for the general election in November against one of two Republicans: Kim Cole or Max Riekse.
And in an exclusive interview with The ‘Gander, Amidon spoke about her firsthand experience as a working-class parent and how it informs her political aspirations.
Amidon became a parent in 2020 and immediately tuned into several issues that fellow new parents and other adults her age struggled with—things that had been highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic. She saw student loans that couldn’t be repaid, unaffordable housing, and a shrinking middle class. Most of all, she saw the childcare crisis, which has forced parents out of the workplace and caused a drag on state economies due to unsustainable costs and care provider shortages.
“When most young people would give up, I decided to double down,” she said. “I worry about my kids, and the fact that my daughter has fewer rights as an American than her mom or grandma had at her age. I just thought, ‘I can’t let my kids grow up and fight the same old stupid fights,’ and I said, ‘I’m going to do what I can to make sure that my kids and other people’s children are set up for success.’”
Amidon, a newcomer to political candidacy, believes this firsthand experience makes her better suited to office than many career politicians.
“Government is of the people, by the people, and for the people,” she said. “It was never meant to be run by career politicians. These seats in Lansing were meant for people who live the everyday issues. That’s why I’m going to have a great perspective. And I actually care. I actually care about people’s voices being heard that are not normally heard from, from Muskegon Heights all the way down to the most rural corners of this district.”
Amidon has made childcare a cornerstone of her campaign. She believes in working toward universal childcare for Michiganders and detailed some of her ideas to get there.
“You have to stabilize the early childhood education workforce,” she said. “They have to be able to make a living wage so that we reduce the turnover.”
Other ideas she mentioned included incentivizing recruitment and retention for the workforce, providing dedicated long-term public funding for early childhood education, and incentivizing employers to create onsite or co-op childcare solutions.
In addition to backing better childcare solutions, Amidon also said she’s supportive of unions, which she called “the backbone of our communities.”
“In Michigan, we were able to overturn right-to-work and restore collective bargaining for unions,” she said. “That’s going to have a huge impact, especially on the next generation, where we’re seeing people are hesitant to go to college and go the more traditional route of taking student loans out and having that ball and chain follow you your whole life.
“[Michigan unions] bring true opportunity and stability to families and to young people who need to choose a career.”
She’s also focused on conservation efforts, which she sees as common sense. Amidon said keeping the Michigan countryside green benefits Michigan children in the future and farmers, fishers, and hunters today.
Her support for conservation efforts in Michigan offer a holistic view of who she is as a person.She said the environment “gives us all a starting point—something in common to talk about. It doesn’t matter if you’re a Democrat or a Republican; we need clean water and clean air to bring tourists to this lakeshore.”
More than anything, Amidon wants to transcend party lines. She and her website both frequently mention bipartisan cooperation to meet all Michiganders’ common interests, such as parents wanting strong schools for their kids, residents wanting good roads for their cars, and bringing childcare costs down.
Amidon has been endorsed by countless unions, Moms Demand Action, Emily’s List, the Black Women’s Caucus, Michigan League of Conservation Voters, and such high-profile figures as Michigan State Representative Will Snyder (D-87) and Muskegon Mayor Ken Johnson.
For more info on Brooks’ campaign, including her stance on the issues, visit her website, DrBrooksforSenate.com.
For more info on Amidon’s campaign, including her stance on the issues, visit her website, RebeccaAmidon.com.
