GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — FOX 17 talked with two professors from Western Michigan University to get a better idea of what to expect when the polls close Tuesday evening.
Dr. Peter Wielhouwer, Political Science professor at Western Michigan University, weighed in on the GOP gubernatorial race.
"I think there are a couple of thigns going on. One, is it's often the case that when you have people that are not, don't have a lot of experience in politics and had to actually work together in a legislature, for example, to get things done, they don't really have that background about how important things really are. It also creates a problem for whoever the winning candidate is. The winning candidate has to be able to consolidate the base of all those republican voters who come [Tuesday], as well as those who don't show up, in order to have the best shot at defeating Gretchen Whitmer in November. And it just makes it harder if candidates are not willing to throw their support behind whoever the winning candidate is," Dr. Wielhouwer told FOX 17 Tuesday evening.
Western Michigan University Political Science professor John Clark explained why the state's recent redistricting could cause some confusion.
"Every ten years when we have redistricting, it really creates a lot of uncertainty because even incumbent elected officials, in many cases, are now facing different voters and so it takes time for voters to learn who those candidates are, to learn a little bit about them. From the candidates' perspective, it creates a lot of uncertainty and, I suspect that for a lot of voters, there was uncertainty in this cycle, as well, trying to figure out exactly who was going to be on their ballot, but among those candidates, who was on their ballot, who they would choose to support," Clark said.
