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Kamala Harris isn’t giving up the battle to win Michigan even as polls show flagging enthusiasm among Democratic-leaning voters in the state.
The Harris campaign was out Wednesday with a banner flown over the MLB American League playoff game in Detroit dubbing her opponent, Donald Trump, an “anti-union scab”. The banner flew over Comerica Park from 11am to 3pm, according to a campaign press release, though photos were not immediately found on social media.
Michigan is a union-heavy state thanks in large part to the concentration of the US auto industry in Detroit and the surrounding areas. But the state, part of the historic “Blue Wall”, voted for Donald Trump in 2016 before returning to Joe Biden’s camp in 2020.
A Quinnipiac poll of Michigan released on Wednesday showed Harris trailing her opponent in the state by the low single digits, dragged down by voters’ lack of confidence in her and her party’s ability to manage global crises, including the currently expanding war in the Middle East.
Harris has made up ground since taking over the Democratic ticket, however, and is still within striking distance of Trump not only in swing states that have voted for Democrats in recent cycles, like Michigan, but also others like Florida that have trended redder in the past few election years.
"Donald Trump repeatedly broke his promises to Michigan’s workers and left them behind as president,” the Harris campaign said in a statement. “Not only did a critical auto plant near Detroit close on his watch as the manufacturing industry bled thousands of jobs, but Trump said if it had been up to him, he could have let auto companies ‘go bankrupt’ during the Great Recession and continues to attack union workers."
The American League playoffs are now a matchup between two regional rivals — the Cleveland Guardians and Detroit Tigers. The series, a best of 5, is tied at one game each. The winner will go on to face the leader of the National League in the World Series.
Detroit last won the World Series exactly 40 years ago.
Trump and Harris both plan to target Michigan with campaign stops in the coming days; the vice president will be represented by Minnesota’s governor Tim Walz, her running mate, at a rally on Thursday while Trump is set to be in the state Thursday for an address to the Detroit Economic Club.
