Michigan’s Democratic governor Whitmer refuses ‘artificial’ deadline to announce state’s votes in presidential election

Swing state’s governor Gretchen Whitmer has raised concerns after she refused to say when the votes from her state in the November election would be announced, claiming deadlines are set by “people with political agendas.”

“Michigan will be able to announce results, but we are not going to have artificial deadlines set by, you know, people with political agendas,” the governor told CBS’ ‘Face the Nation’ on Sunday. “We’re gonna get this right.”

Whitmer claimed the announcement will come “soon after the polls close,” but she refused to commit to a time or even day, simply insisting “we’re gonna get it right.”

Concern has been raised by both Democrats and Republicans in regards to election results due to what is likely to be a record year for mail-in ballots considering the Covid-19 pandemic. Many Democrats have insisted the true results could not be known the night of the election, while President Donald Trump has cast doubt on the mail-in ballots sent out to voters, as well as polling locations themselves. 

Whitmer responded to a recent comment by Trump encouraging supporters to “be poll watchers” when they vote to look for fraud by saying, "We're gonna keep people safe as they go to the polls, and we will not tolerate anyone who's trying to interfere with someone's ability to safely vote."

Whitmer’s refusal to commit to a timeframe in announcing voting results has sparked outrage, especially with conservatives, many of whom have already been critical of the Democratic governor and her controversial Covid-19 lockdown orders in Michigan.

“The ‘new normal’ — you don’t deserve to know the winner on election night,” Fox News’ Laura Ingraham tweeted. 

In 2016’s presidential election, results for Michigan, considered an important swing state, had the narrowest margin of any state’s results with Trump walking away with 47.5 percent of the vote and Hillary Clinton earning 42.27 percent. Around 10,000 votes decided where the state’s 16 electoral votes went.

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