Michigan controls our elections, not the executive branch

On October 22, 2026, nearly two weeks before Alaska's November 3 election, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit seeking to block or delay certification of Alaska's U.S. Senate race if Republican incumbent Dan Sullivan lost, on the grounds that voters might confuse him with a second ballot candidate named Daniel Sullivan. No votes had been counted.

President Donald Trump told NPR the next day, "I'm the one that said do it." In a Truth Social post the same day, Trump called the ballot "totally confusing" and a "SCAM," and wrote that a court's failure to remove Daniel J. Sullivan was "ridiculous."

Alaska election officials, including Elections Director Carol Beecher, moved to dismiss the suit, telling the court it "has no legal basis." In the state's filing, Beecher wrote, "the United States lacks authority to intervene in state elections at all, much less in support of a favored candidate." A federal judge, Sharon Gleason, put the case on an accelerated schedule ahead of the November 3 vote, with Mary Peltola's campaign, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the League of Women Voters and Common Cause all seeking to intervene or dismiss.

Who counts your vote in Michigan

Michigan's elections are administered by 1,521 city and township clerks — 281 city and 1,240 township — the people who run the polling place and process the ballots where voters actually live. Adding the 83 county clerks brings the total to 1,604 county and local election officials, none of them federal employees. The first step of the chain is local: a ballot is received, secured, and counted by the voter's own township or city clerk and the election workers in the community, not by anyone in Washington.

Under Michigan law, members of the public may watch ballot processing and counting from a designated public viewing area, including at absent voter counting boards, where mail-in ballots are handled. Poll watchers may observe the count but cannot handle ballots or interfere with it; the watching is open, but the handling stays with the sworn election workers.

The county check

Each of Michigan's 83 counties convenes its own bipartisan board of canvassers — people from both major parties together — to review, reconcile, and certify the precinct and local results before any statewide result is assembled. Under Michigan law, each county board must begin canvassing by 9:00 a.m. on the Thursday after the election. It must certify its results no later than the 14th day after election day — for this cycle, Tuesday, November 17, 2026. Then the county clerk must transmit the certified results to the Secretary of State within 24 hours. If a county board fails to certify, it must transmit its records to the Board of State Canvassers, which then determines the result by the 20th day.

The statewide step

Michigan's Board of State Canvassers is four members, two Democrats and two Republicans: chair Richard Houskamp, a Republican; vice chair Mary Ellen Gurewitz, a Democrat; Paul Cordes, a Republican; and Heather Cummings, a Democrat. The board must meet publicly to canvass the statewide returns and announce its determination no later than the 20th day after the election — for this cycle, Monday, November 23, 2026.

For a midterm, the Board of State Canvassers — not the governor — is the only Michigan body authorized to certify who won statewide and federal offices, including the governor's race. The Secretary of State then completes the resulting certificate of election as a ministerial step. The governor's direct certification role is limited to presidential elections, when Michigan law requires the governor to issue the certificate of ascertainment naming the presidential electors after the board has determined the vote. Jocelyn Benson, Michigan's Secretary of State, is the state's chief election officer; Gretchen Whitmer is the governor.

In Michigan the sequence runs the other direction: the count happens first, in public, at the local level; the review is done by county canvassers from both parties; and only then does a Michigan board certify a Michigan result — with no point in the chain that touches the White House or the Justice Department.

How to watch it happen

You can watch the count at the local level. Michigan law gives members of the public a designated viewing area at the polling place and at absent voter counting boards, where mail-in ballots are handled. Each of the 83 county boards must certify by Tuesday, November 17, 2026, and then the county clerk must tell the Secretary of State within 24 hours — a deadline you can check in your own county's public records. The Board of State Canvassers meets in public and must announce its determination by Monday, November 23, 2026.

The people who actually certify your Michigan result are your county canvassers and the four-member state board — all of them Michigan officials you can identify and whose public meetings and deadlines you can track, with no step running through Washington.