By all indications, Duggan doesn't appear to be interested in jumping in.
I would be shocked if Duggan has a higher name recognition than Whitmer. Whitmer has been around for years and almost certainly is more well known in Michigan.
As for why Duggan is doing so much better than Whitmer, best guess is that he's gaining from the shine of Detroit's bounce back, while Whitmer might have a little "been around too long" syndrome.
I'm a huge fan of Duggan; all signs point to him not running, but this poll could encourage him to take the leap.
Is El-Sayed gaining any traction?
Sadly, I don't think that he is. At least not yet. He's barnstorming the State, meeting with and talking with a lot of voters, but I'm just not sure how many people he's convincing.
Frankly, his biggest problem (aside from being a brown, Muslim man in the Midwest) is that he's only 32. Lotta Midwest voters would have a hard time voting for anyone age 32, let alone a brown one with the name Abdul.
Mike Duggan just won re-election as mayor on Tuesday. He’s not going to run.
If Mike Duggan thinks he can win the primary and general and
wants to be governor, that won't stop him. Problem is he's denied it for years (not that that matters much) and that MI dems have been wanting Whitmer to run for a while now. Much as I wish it weren't so, it seems to me like Whitmer has an "it's her turn" type of backing from the state party and it isn't clear that the apparatus would prefer Duggan. If there are several polls like this, that sort of thinking could change...
In Illinois, the state Dem party had been lobbying Kennedy to run for a while, but once he did, the party dumped him for a "better" candidate; it isn't clear that the Michigan party would do the same for Duggan.
