Your Analysis of the MI Senate Race Should Note That Mike Rogers Is a Losing Loser

There were two good explainers about the Michigan US Senate race this week, despite their titles. One, by G. Elliott Morris, has Abdul El-Sayed’s name and the L word in it. The other, by Noah Berlatsky, has just El-Sayed’s last name and the word “bad.” As someone compelled by the power of framing as conveyed by George Lakoff, this aches me. Because bad framing too often betrays the truth.

And the truth is, Mike Rogers is a huge loser. If he were any bigger a loser, Michigan Republicans would have nominated him to run for governor.

The plain-brand W. Bush-era congressman who helped drag us into losing two wars, during his 15 years in the U.S. House, lost to Elissa Slotkin. He lost as Donald Trump won Michigan by more than any Republican in 36 years. He got 122,956 fewer votes than Trump. In contrast, John James, the bigger loser Republicans have nominated for governor, got 7,619 fewer votes than Trump in 2020.

Over 100,000 Trump Voters Said No

This is a flaming red flag! Michigan has straight-ticket voting. It’s as easy to just vote the whole ballot for one party as it is to vote for Donald Trump. The most generous explanation for why Rogers’ lag with Trump voters was 16 TIMES LARGER than James' is that Elon Musk brought in a hell of a lot of low-information voters who didn’t even know how our ballot worked? Because the less generous explanation is that over 100,000 Trump voters went out of their way not to vote for Mike Rogers just because he’s Mike Rogers.

And James was facing a much better candidate!

Gary Peters is a vet who seemed a credible populist for minutes at a time but mostly played it down the middle in the Senate. He’s a much better candidate than Elissa Slotkin, who seems to think getting 23,847 fewer votes than Harris/Walz makes her a 2028 frontrunner. That drop-off makes her look a lot worse than James did, but still nowhere near as much of a loser as Mike Rogers.

Importing Rejects to Lose the Next War

The point here is that there is no reason to expect Rogers to do better in 2026 than in 2024 unless there’s something in the water in Florida.

Michigan’s Republican Party, much like Pennsylvania’s GOP, is such a mess that they have to import rejects from the Iraq War to help lose the Iran War. Why? The Flint Water Crisis is too simple an answer. Rick Snyder was able to win by positioning himself as not really being a Republican because we’ve seen in this state what these guys do and how they do it. We’ve watched the DeVoses ravage the state with their fundamentalist proto-Trumpism. And we still beat them any time it’s a fair fight.

Growing the Base vs. Burning It

I’m counting on Abdul to win. I’m counting on him to win in large part because Rogers cannot defend the indefensible or really explain why he’s running, other than that Trump made him do it. And that’s really all you need to know. He’s running to help Trump rule Michigan, even if it means stealing our votes.

Meanwhile, Abdul is a different type of politician, the kind that wants to make sure we all have Medicare that covers dental, vision, and hearing.

Michigan Democrats have lucked the hell out this year.

MAGA Mike Duggan decided not to play spoiler in the governor’s race. Republicans nominated proven statewide losers. And voters picked Abdul, who will bring in key new anti-system voters to the Democratic coalition while, hopefully, helping begin the process of rebuilding a Democratic Party after our failures to stand up for the people of Gaza. Stevens would have done neither. This is called growing the base.

It’s the exact opposite of what a loser like Mike Rogers did in 2024. And think about that when you’re trying to process the potential outcomes for 2026.

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