Lame Duck Session | Right Michigan

Lame duck session is one of the most fascinating and illuminating times within our government. It is a period when all pretenses of our democracy are jettisoned and a mad cash grab takes place as term-limited legislators secure employment and other benefits in smoke-filled backrooms with lobbyists. It rips off the facade and exposes government for the cruel, soulless machine that it truly is.

Few watched the late-night session that went past 3AM last week when the worst bills were being rammed down our throats. I tuned in to watch the after-hours con job the next day on the Michigan Legislature website as I was sleeping at the time. The fact that the proceedings took place in the dead of night begs the following questions: What are the optics of using the midnight hour to push the lousiest bills forward? What does someone who is less politically inclined think of Republicans after the media reports on these shenanigans? And is it any wonder why we took it on the chin during last month’s mid-term elections?

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Replacement of Representative Plawecki on the Ballot Reveals Democratic Party Discord, Preparation for a Lame Duck Session?

During a week of dramatic racial conflict across the U.S.A, few noticed a more subdued racial conflict which surfaced right here in Michigan. First term Michigan State Representative Julie Plawecki died on June 25^th during a hike on Misery Ridge at Smith Rock, Oregon. Representative Plawecki was running unopposed for reelection in the Democratic primary on August 2^nd, in Michigan’s 11^th State House District. Representative Plawecki’s death occurred after the April 19^th Michigan primary election filing deadline, so it is up to the local party to select a replacement Democrat to appear on the November 8^th ballot in accordance with PA 116 of 1954.

The ‘local party’ in this particular instance is the Michigan 13^th Congressional District Democratic Party (SoS BoE 516418). Representative Conyers represents the 13^th Congressional District, even though he hasn’t lived in it since the 2012 redistricting. Even so, Representative Conyers does maintain control over the 13^th Congressional District Democratic Party apparatus through his agent Jonathan C. Kinloch. Mr. Kinloch, a Detroiter who also resides outside the 11^th State House District, is perhaps best known as an Emergency Manager appointed member of the esteemed Detroit Board of Education.

Half of the 11^th Michigan House District’s population is in Garden City and Inkster, with the balance in attached pieces of Westland, Dearborn Heights and Livonia. Garden City and Inkster are polar opposites ethnically, but both vote heavily Democratic. The Westland and Dearborn Heights segments of the 11^th are somewhere in between Garden City and Inkster, while the small segment of Livonia trends Republican. Hidden in the Census data for this district are substantial South Asian and Arab ethnic communities, but the district’s African-American population fraction is pretty well identified by the Census at about 35%.