- Lawyers for Gov. Gretchen Whitmer argue courts can’t compel her to call a special election in the 35th senate district
- Whitmer is “currently deciding” when to call a special election, according to the attorneys seeking to block a lawsuit over the extended vacancy
- The district has been vacant for nearly 8 months, 237 days, since Kristen McDonald Rivet resigned the seat
LANSING — Attorneys for Gov. Gretchen Whitmer contend she has no obligation to call a special election to fill a long-vacant seat in the 35th state Senate district, and they argue courts don’t have the power to make her do so.
The vacancy became apparent in November, when Democratic state Sen. Kristen McDonald Rivet won election to Congress. She officially resigned from the Legislature on Jan. 3 as she took her post in Washington.
More than 230 days later, Whitmer “is currently deciding when to schedule the election” and “fully intends” to call one, her attorneys wrote Thursday in response to a lawsuit seeking to force her hand. “She just has not done so yet.”
A group of residents earlier this month sued Whitmer for failing to call a special election, arguing the 270,000 people in the district comprising Midland, Saginaw and Bay City deserve representation as quickly as possible.
Philip Ellison, a lawyer representing the plaintiffs in the suit, previously told Bridge Michigan that the lack of an election “is a denial of one of the most fundamental political rights.”
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But in urging Court of Claims Judge James Robert Redford to dismiss the suit, Whitmer’s lawyers on Thursday turned to the separation of powers as a key rationale why she can’t be forced to call an election.
“This court does not have the authority to compel the governor to act,” assistant attorneys general Erik Grill and Heather Meingast wrote in the filing, noting a court has never before forced a governor to take an official act.
They also argued that the plaintiffs, who are residents of the district, don’t have standing to bring their suit because they haven’t articulated an injury from not having representation in the state Senate.
“Plaintiffs’ assertion the governor has somehow missed some unstated deadline” to call an election “finds no support in the law,” they wrote. “The governor enjoys discretion to choose an election date between the creation of the vacancy and the next general election.”
Grill and Meingast noted the Legislature has not changed the law “to include a time limit as to when the governor must act.”
Whitmer has previously vetoed legislation in 2022 that would place a 30-day deadline on when an election must be called after a vacancy, with the explanation that she would not “tie the hands of future Michigan governors.”
Republicans have accused Whitmer of playing politics with the vacant seat in a district they believe they could flip. If a Republican won the seat, it could effectively shift the balance of power in the Senate and potentially stop all legislation without Republican support from advancing in the chamber.
With the legislature yet to negotiate a budget, Democratic control of that chamber remains crucial for their ability to mitigate the deep cuts proposed by the GOP-majority House. Democrats also hope their electoral prospects will improve as the 2026 midterm elections near.
Some local Democrats have also complained about the prolonged Senate vacancy.
Earlier this week, a coalition of young Democrats that included college and high school caucuses released a statement calling on Whitmer to hold an election, saying it was “long past time.”
They retracted the statement about two and a half hours later.
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