| ||||||||||||||||||||
Turnout | 41.6% 1.3 [1] | |||||||||||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ||||||||||||||||||||
Snyder: 40–50% 50–60% 60–70% 70–80% 80–90% >90% Schauer: 40–50% 50–60% 60–70% 70–80% 80–90% >90% Tie: | ||||||||||||||||||||
|
Elections in Michigan |
---|
The 2014 Michigan gubernatorial election took place on November 4, 2014, to elect the governor of Michigan, concurrently with the election of Michigan's Class II U.S. Senate seat, as well as other elections to the United States Senate in other states and elections to the United States House of Representatives and various state and local elections.
Incumbent Republican governor Rick Snyder ran for re-election to a second term in office.[2] Primary elections took place on August 5, 2014, in which Snyder and former U.S. representative Mark Schauer were unopposed in the Republican and Democratic primaries, respectively.[3]
Snyder was considered vulnerable in his bid for a second term, as reflected in his low approval ratings.[4][5][6][7] The consensus among The Cook Political Report,[8] Governing,[9] The Rothenberg Political Report,[10] and Sabato's Crystal Ball[11] was that the contest was a "tossup". Snyder was saddled with a negative approval rating, while his Democratic opponent, former U.S. representative Mark Schauer, suffered from a lack of name recognition.[12][13] Despite having a more centrist voting record in the House of Representatives,[14] Schauer ran as more of a populist who put education, unions and taxes as his top priorities.[15]
Despite concerns about his approval rating hurting his chances at victory, Snyder was re-elected with 50.9% of the vote. As of 2024, this was the last time a Republican won the governorship of Michigan. This is also the last time the Republican candidate won the counties of Kalamazoo, Oakland, Clinton, Macomb, Kent, Leelanau, and Isabella, and the last time the Democratic candidate won the counties of Alger, Baraga, and Manistee. As of 2024, this is the last time that the winner of the Michigan gubernatorial election won a majority of Michigan's counties. This was the first election since 1990 that the winner was of a different party than the concurrent Senate election.
reelection
was invoked but never defined (see the help page).