Michigan Democratic Party chair on Stevens' endorsement of Rogers

We're back on Fox 2 Detroit Live, a special show right here doing all election coverage on a day when the Michigan Democratic Party, well, they were shocked, stunned to find out Congresswoman Haley Stevens on the Democratic Party. Well, she decided to endorse Republican candidate Mike Rogers today, U.S. Senate candidate. Now, certainly a big shakeup after this announcement. And in fact, this is a picture of her attending a church mass today with Mike Rogers. And then there were moments after where she spoke to the media and gave us a little insight on why she made this decision to. Jump ship, let's listen. Come to the podium. The podium. If you could get back in the gaggle, please. Thanks, y'all. All right. Congresswoman and Mike, you want to make a couple of remarks? Yeah. Well, thank you, and greetings to the press corps. My name's Haley Stevens. I'm a proud Democrat, and I am endorsing Mike Rogers for the United States Senate. I am one vote in this state. Michigan is a swing state. And I have a divided household, as some of you have heard, up until last night. But even my own mother cast her vote for Mike Rogers as my own father cast his vote for Abdul. This is a very close election. We all know that. But Abdul made very clear that I was not welcome in his campaign, that he didn't need me there, that he didn't want me there. And at some point, you've got to look at who's standing for country. You know, there's always a lot of elections taking place in America, and this is one. I'm going to cast my ballot. I still haven't done that. And 90% of the votes I'm going to cast are going to be for Democrats. All right, there you hear it. She says she's still a proud Democrat. So I had to put in a call, of course, and get Chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party on the line, Curtis Hertel, Jr. So good to have you join me today. I don't know if you can hear me. Okay, there we go. There you go. Well, big question. Your reaction to all of this, is this a total surprise? Well, if you lie to enough people, you can surprise anyone. I mean, she lied to her own colleagues. She lied to me. She lied to Jim Clyburn, which I can't even imagine doing that. The only real surprise in this situation is her leaving what her values are. I mean, she said that Mike Rogers would be a rubber stamp for... President Trump, you know, if President Trump promised that prices would be lower on day one, say 400, people are not experiencing that. No more foreign wars, certainly not experiencing that. And at the end of the day, people are hurting. His attacks on the Voting Rights Act and everything else, I think that Mike Rogers stands in lockstep with Donald Trump. She has abandoned what her values are. Now that we know about this political bombshell, is it safe to say she's been kicked out of all the group chats with your party? Listen, I mean, this is more important than a party. This is a lie to her constituents. She said that she was going to stand up for them against what Donald Trump was doing. Uh, you know, She said that she was going to protect people, and whether it's her constituents in Detroit who are upset about the attacks on their voting rights, whether it is people in the LGBTQ community. Mike Rogers is running anti-ads on the air during football games just today. Um, yeah. And if those are the values that she wants to stand with, then she's changed who she is. And she's no longer a Democrat. But at the same time, watching all this today, I'm not sure if Haley Stevens knows who Haley Stevens is right now. And I think I'm certainly concerned and sad about that, but no one can tolerate this now. I mean, is it safe to ask where she stands with the party in the future if she ever does do a return? Well, she's not a member of the party. Very, very interesting to say. Okay, so Stevens' explanation. She says her decision was putting her country before party. My question to you is, do you believe she woke up and made this decision? Was this just something that happened today? It depends on what version of the interviews you've seen today. I mean, on CNN five minutes ago, she said she wasn't invited to a party. I didn't, you know, this is not high school. I'm sorry that she wasn't invited to the slumber party or whatever else, but, like, these things have real consequences. And for her to make a major decision like that based on some kind of spite is, I think, really, really sad. Uh... But at the end of the day, you know, she doesn't want to stand up for the values of the things that she fought for. Unfortunately, I think her constituents... are really sad. We've heard from people all across the district and throughout the state that are really sad. But I will say this, it's united the party. We had more people out knocking doors today. Hours afterwards, people were showing up in a record number to knock doors across the state because they're angry about what happened. And I feel good about what the election results will be on Tuesday. And this is an unfortunate moment for the Congress. Have you had a chance to speak with Dr. Abdul El-Sayed about this and what his thoughts were? I know he mentioned Haley Stevens wasn't even in his mind, but, you know, I'd love to hear what your insight is on what he thinks. Putting money out of politics, putting money in people's pockets and Medicare for all. And that's what his focus has been on this campaign. And I doubt he's really worried about Haley. What would you say is your message to independent voters who are frustrated with both parties, not just the Republicans, but the Democrats and who want to just simply vote but don't know who to vote for? Well, I think it's pretty simple for me. Donald Trump promised that he would do a couple of things. The prices will go down on day one, it's day 400. What do you pay for ground beef and what do you pay for gas? We promise there will be no more foreign wars. We have these reckless tariffs, this foreign war of choice, driven up prices on every single person in this state. And when Democrats were in power in state government, we passed the largest tax cut for working families in history, brought 30,000 kids out of poverty, free breakfast and lunch for every kid. We ended the retirement tax. We restored workers' rights. Largest investment in affordable housing. I think people want a different way. And somebody has got to put a check on the corruption of this administration and the effect that it has had on people. And so I would ask people to vote Democratic, and I think they will. I mean, with just 48 hours to go, how confident are you that the Democrats are going to win this Michigan U.S. Senate race? Every fundamental tells me that we should be in good shape, but at the end of the day, I'm a Democrat. I've been disappointed in election results. You should always run like you're five points down. So we're going to continue to do the work. We're going to continue to talk to voters. We're going to keep encouraging people to get out to the polls. If they do that, we'll win. But, uh... Republicans win elections by dividing us. They've run the most Islamophobic campaign that I've ever seen in Michigan. It's disgusting. Other commercials that are on the air right now. And I believe that if we do the work, we will win these elections. Certainly, clock's ticking, so we'll see what happens. For now, Curtis Hertel, Jr., chairman of the Michigan Democratic Party, thank you for taking the time to join us. I know it's super late, but I know the clock is ticking and we have a lot of work ahead of us. We appreciate it.