Jill Biden campaigns in Oakland County
Jill Biden spoke of her husband’s strength and faith during a campaign stop in Madison Heights on Tuesday, speaking to dozens of socially distanced supporters at the Oakland County Democratic Party headquarters.
The former second lady was campaigning on behalf of her husband, Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, who also visited Michigan last week with stops in Southfield and Detroit. Earlier in the afternoon, Biden toured an urban farm in Detroit, which preceded stops in Dearborn and Saginawfor votermobilization events.
“This is it Oakland County,” said Biden as she spoke of the trust and hope that she believes her husband
would bring back to the White House. “Soon we will have a commander in chief that will bring out the best in us. We can’t sit back and watch what happens. We have to decide what happens. Make a plan today and get involved.”
Biden said voters inMichigan, a key battleground state, could “decide our future for generations to come” while encouraging those in attendance to vote for her husband.
“Michigan, we’re going to do this together,” she said. Joe’s strength of will is unstoppable and his faith is unshakable because it’s not in politicians or political parties or even himself, it’s in the providence of God. It’s in the potential of our country. His faith is in you and in us. “Joe Biden will be a president for all Americans andhehas a plan to endthis pandemic and to rebuild and reimagine a future that’s better than ever.”
Many of those in attendance were female canvassers getting ready to knock on doors and encourage county resident to vote. It’s expected that suburban women voters, including many in Oakland County, will play a critical role in the outcome of the 2020 election. On Oct. 13, President Trump made an appeal to suburban women to support his reelection bid amid polls showing his campaign losing interest among that demographic of voters in the final weeks leading up to Election Day on
Tuesday, Nov. 3.
Biden finished her speech in Madison Heights asking supporters to envision the future her husbandwill help build and the news headlines Americans will likely see on Nov. 4, one day following the election.
“You wake up and it’s a beautiful morning like today,” she said. “Maybe, you stayed up too late watching the returns so you pour yourself a cup of coffee. You go to check the news and you notice there’s no pit in your stomach and that your shoulders don’t tense up. You’re not dreading what’s going on in the world. Instead, you see the headline you’ve been waiting to see, Trump is fired.”
In 2016, the majority of Oakland County voters, 51.3%, chose Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton over then Republican nominee Donald Trump, who received 43.2% of the vote. Statewide, Michiganders narrowly favored Trump over Clinton by 10,700 votes, the closest presidential race in the state’s history.
Over the past four years, Oakland County has been turningmore and more blue. In 2018, the county board of commissioners became a Democratic majority for the first time in over 40 years with five of the county’s top six elected offices now held by Democrats, including County Executive David Coulter.
Michigan remains one of the most critical states for both Biden and Trump with recent polls showing Biden up 7-10 percentage points over Trump in the Great Lakes state. In 2016, Michigan’s 16 electoral college votes handed Trump the 270 electoral college votes he needed to win the White House.