Donald Trump, Bill Clinton Both in Detroit Labor Day Weekend

DETROIT, MI — Any doubt that Michigan is a battleground state in the 2016 race to the White House should be erased this extended weekend with back-to-back visits by Republican nominee Donald Trump on Saturday and former President Bill Clinton on Labor Day.

Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, will be campaigning in Ohio, another important swing state, with her running mate, Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, at Labor Day observances in Cleveland.

Though the race is tightening in Michigan, Clinton leads Trump in an aggregate of polls by RealClear Politics, which gives the former secretary of state a 4.6 point advantage. Michigan is a “toss up,” though, and with 16 electoral votes up for grabs, neither candidate is taking it for granted.

The Ipsos/Reuters poll released Wednesday shows Trump with a 1-point lead over Clinton, 44 percent to 33 percent, in Michigan. He also holds leads in New Hampshire (14 points), Wisconsin (3 points) and Maine (1 point) in that poll.

Nationally, the Ipsos/Reuters poll shows Clinton’s lead shrank 7 points in the past week as Trump pivoted his campaign to shore up support with Republican voters. Among likely voters in November, Clinton has a razor-thin lead, 40 percent to 39 percent, the poll said. A new Fox News poll released Wednesday also shows Clinton’s lead is evaporating, and she has just a 2 point lead in the first survey of a four-way matchup that includes Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson and Green Party candidate Jill Stein, who siphon more votes from Clinton than from Trump.

If Trump pulls off a win in Michigan, he will be the first Republican to do so since 1988. In 2012, President Barack Obama carried Michigan by 9.5 points.

Trump’s Saturday visit in Detroit, where he will try to strengthen his support among African-American voters, will include a stop at Great Faith Ministries International. He won’t speak at the 11 a.m. service but has agreed to an interview with the congregation’s leader, Bishop Wayne T. Jackson, that will be aired about a week after the event on the church’s Impact Network, an African-American-owned Christian broadcast network.

Jackson is getting pushback from the greater Detroit community and from black pastors across the country, who were offended by what they saw as pandering by Trump when, speaking to a mostly white audience in Michigan on Aug. 19, he suggested African-Americans would be better served by Republicans than by Democrats with his now infamous pitch: “What the hell do you have to lose?”

“My phone has been burning up,” Jackson told Detroit Free Press columnist Rochelle Riley, adding the interview is neither a Trump rally nor an endorsement on his part.

“This is engagement, for him to tell us what he wants to do,” Jackson said. “I owe this to my viewers.”

Among those who aren’t happy about Jackson’s invitation to Trump is the Rev. W.J. Rideout III, pastor of All God’s People Church, who is organizing a protest outside of Jackson’s church at 10735 Grand River Ave. during the time Trump is visiting.

“I think he’s a racist, I think he’s a bigot and I think he doesn’t have a care for humankind,” Rideout said of Trump in an interview with The Detroit News.

Other details of Trump’s visit haven’t been confirmed, but he is expected to tour some of Detroit’s hardest-hit neighborhoods with primary rival Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon who grew up in one of Detroit’s toughest neighborhoods.

With his Labor Day weekend visit, Trump is attempting to claim what has traditionally been Democratic territory with big parades and campaign events put on by labor unions. As a surrogate for his wife, Bill Clinton will take part in the Labor Day parade. More details of the trip are expected to be announced Thursday.

Lansing political consultant and Michigan State university professor Robert Kolt told the Detroit Free Press having one of the Clintons at the Labor Day festivities is an important opportunity to shore up support among Democrats and recruit campaign volunteers.

“Bill Clinton is loved and appreciated throughout the party,” he said. “If you don’t have Hillary Clinton at an event, Bill is as good or better.”

Bill Clinton’s North American Free Trade Agreement is unpopular with organized labor, but Kolt doesn’t expect that to dampen support.

“NAFTA is history in the labor movement and people have moved on from it. You can have an argument in the family and still be family, and Bill is family to these labor guys,” he told the Free Press. “They know what he did as president and one trade agreement isn’t going to ruin the relationship.”

Photos by Gage Skidmore via Flickr Commons