| | | | |  | | By Brakkton Booker, Gloria Gonzalez and Jesse Naranjo | Happy Election Day and greetings from battleground Michigan, Recast fam. Here’s today’s agenda:
- What a key Arab mayor’s support for Trump could signal in Michigan
- How Bad Bunny is trying to sway Puerto Rico’s gubernatorial race
- Everything we’re watching, from congressional races to ballot initiatives
|  Mayor Bill Bazzi sits for an interview in his offic Monday in Dearborn Heights, Michigan. | Brakkton Booker/POLITICO | Bill Bazzi, the mayor of Dearborn Heights, Michigan, was all smiles when we met in his office yesterday, on Election Day eve. He’d just wrapped his finishing touches on a speech he would give in Grand Rapids later in the evening at Trump’s final campaign rally. Bazzi, along with Amer Ghalib, the mayor of nearby Hamtramck, are Muslim and Arab leaders who are stumping for Trump in the critical swing state. Joe Biden won Michigan by roughly 154,000 votes in 2020, leaning heavily on support from areas like Dearborn Heights and Hamtramck, where Arab American voters were pivotal. The mayors’ endorsements came as the former president — with just days to go before the election — swapped his trademark anti-Muslim fearmongering for a softer pitch to Arab and Muslim communities frustrated with the current administration’s handling of the Israel-Gaza conflict. It’s a key issue here in Michigan. This bloc typically votes for Democrats, but if a sizable portion breaks from Kamala Harris , it may be enough to doom her chances in the state and possibly the White House. Bazzi, who fled from Lebanon as a child during its civil war and later joined the Marine Corps to serve in Tunisia and Morocco, tells The Recast that he was planning to support Trump months ago. He also voted for him in both 2016 and 2020.
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The mayor dismissed questions about Trump’s “travel ban,” which he signed on Day 1 of his presidency, and his recent vow to “ban refugee resettlement from terror infested areas like the Gaza Strip.” Despite Trump’s criticism of Palestinians and comments encouraging Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to “finish the job,” Bazzi maintains the former president is “a man of peace,” since no wars were started under his administration.
We talk about Bazzi’s belief in Trump and what turned him off Harris and the Democratic Party — all of which provide a window into the mindset of many pro-Trump Arab voters who could sway tonight’s election results in Michigan. ◆◆◆ This interview has been edited for length and clarity. THE RECAST: We’re speaking on the verge of a historic election. You are a barrier breaker in your own right: the first Arab and first Muslim mayor of Dearborn Heights. This is still considered a really blue section of Michigan, so your endorsement of Trump raised lots of eyebrows. Talk me through the process of that decision. BAZZI: Both my parents were auto workers. It was always taught: You’ve got to work hard. My parents were socially conservative. But my parents always voted with Democrats. They thought, “Democrats are gonna take care of people like us.” All our life, we grew up thinking that. With my experience with the military, spending time overseas, deployed to different countries that I served in and visited, getting to know leaders of different countries ... I wasn’t making a decision on the fly. In this election I was supporting Trump all the way. | 
Bazzi speaks beside Trump at a campaign rally Oct. 26 in Novi, Michigan. | Alex Brandon/AP | THE RECAST: So this decision was prior to the switch on the Democratic side, when Harris was elevated to the top of the ticket. BAZZI: Exactly. Under Biden, there's wars that were started, major wars under his administration. Wars that can lead us to World War III. Our economy is really bad at this point. I talked to a resident yesterday as she was putting her ballot in a box, and she told me she can't afford basic necessities. She's in her 80s, and now we're asking her to ration — to be careful what she eats, how much she eats, because the cost of living and inflation is so high? THE RECAST: Just for my clarification, your mind was made up before Biden stepped out of the race. Harris vowed in East Lansing on Sunday that she “will do everything in my power to end the war in Gaza.” But that hasn’t swayed your decision? BAZZI: My mind was made up from before. My main objective is about peace and economic prosperity for our country. But what really pushed me over the edge is when Kamala Harris brought Liz Cheney to our backyard. I just had a flashback to when her dad, [former Vice President Dick Cheney ], started the war in Iraq, when he was telling the world there's “weapons of mass destruction” there. So we started the war in Iraq under that assumption and at the same time, the company [Halliburton] that her father was tied to ended up making billions from defense contracts. So now you bring a Cheney to our backyard, whose family started a war, and now we're in a war. That's when I was like, enough of this! I decided to go forward with a public endorsement after I chatted with President Trump to find out his platform. He’s a man of peace. | 
| THE RECAST: What did he tell you his proposal was for ending or intervening in the Israel-Gaza conflict? BAZZI: He committed to bringing peace and stability and peace diplomacy and also ending the war. THE RECAST: Okay, so he — BAZZI: But there's no plan, like, “Hey, you know, here's my plan.” It was basically just his statement and his commitment to stopping the war. He [also] said something that was magical: When he was talking about countries sending their criminals into the United States, that he's going to send these people back. I heard him say a few times that if these countries don't want to take their people back, then we just cut their military aid or aid period. THE RECAST: So it sounds like this is about immigration for you, too. BAZZI: This is a serious issue for me, because as a mayor, I'm responsible for the security and safety of all the residents in my city, so I gotta make sure I safeguard every resident that lives in my city or every business. (Editor’s note: Research shows that immigrants, both documented and undocumented, commit crimes at lower rates than the U.S.-born population.) THE RECAST: You said what solidified your decision to go public with your endorsement is when Harris brought Cheney to Michigan to campaign. What you seem to be saying, too, is there may be some guilt by association for both Cheney and Harris. Some people will say Harris is the vice president, she was not the final decision-maker on Israel and what aid is sent to them. And it was not Cheney, but her father, who set the stage for the Iraq invasion. Some may take this as you blaming these two women who didn't have total control on either of these issues. | 
Bazzi shakes Trump's hand at the Oct. 26 rally in Novi, Michigan. | Drew Angerer/AFP via Getty Images | BAZZI: It has nothing to do with gender. [Cheney’s] family benefited so much from the war. Thousands of people were killed over there. We lost a lot of military, some friends of mine that I served with, they were killed in Iraq. Some were injured. Then you bring a Cheney here — the same family tied to the war effort at a time when there are two major wars happening in the Middle East and also Ukraine. When you bring somebody from the Cheney family in, then you use rhetoric like “country before party,” well, this is the silliest thing that I've ever heard. THE RECAST: So if Trump loses, will you be able to work with a Harris administration? BAZZI: All I can say is, God help us. I'm not going to think about it at this point, because my faith is in God. Trump took a bullet for this country and God has something planned for him. I'm very, very optimistic he's going to win this election.
| | | WHO WILL BE PUERTO RICO’S NEXT GOVERNOR?
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A billboard promoting Puerto Rico’s Independence Party and the Citizen Victory Movement gubernatorial candidate Juan Dalmau towers over a highway Saturday in San Juan. | Alejandro Granadillo/AP | Can Bad Bunny help defeat Puerto Rico’s pro-statehood party? Of course, the Puerto Rican Grammy-winning megastar isn’t running for office himself. But he’s definitely taking sides in what could represent a major shakeup in Puerto Rican politics in today’s election, our Gloria Gonzalez writes. We all saw Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio, a powerful cultural figure, step off the sidelines to back Harris, after pro-Trump comedian Tony Hinchcliffe referred to his home as “literally a floating island of garbage.” What you might not have seen? The musician has been making his opinions known in Puerto Rico for months, spending thousands of dollars on billboards that clearly outline his disdain for the pro-statehood New Progressive Party, or Partido Nuevo Progresista, ahead of a critical governor’s race. This past weekend, Bad Bunny appeared at a rally for la “Alianza,” the alliance between minority parties seeking to put an end to the duopoly that has dominated Puerto Rican politics for decades. He emphasized that voting for the PNP is a vote for corruption, saying he envisions a Puerto Rico that’s free of crushing debt and the notoriously fragile power grid. “Bad Bunny, with all his influence, is giving people a safe space” to express their opinions, said Ariadna Michelle Godreau Aubert, executive director for Ayuda Legal Puerto Rico, which works to protect residents’ rights to affordable housing and energy. Puerto Rico’s political divide doesn’t mirror the Republican and Democratic party system in the mainland United States — rather the divide is based on Puerto Rico’s territory status. Local politics have been dominated by the pro-statehood PNP and the pro-commonwealth status Popular Democratic Party or Partido Popular Democrático. But, as frustration grows in Puerto Rico, an increasing number of young voters are looking for a new political home. They may be finding it in the alliance between the Citizens’ Victory Movement or Movimento Victoria Ciudadana party, which supports a constitutional assembly to determine Puerto Rico’s status, and Puerto Rico’s Independence Party.
|  Until recently, polls consistently showed a lead for current Resident Commissioner Jenniffer González-Colón. | Andrew Harnik/AP | PNP’s candidate for governor, Jenniffer González-Colón, had a strong double-digit lead in the polls in late July and early August given her name recognition and experience as Congress’ resident commissioner of Puerto Rico. But more recent polling is showing a surge in support for Juan Dalmau Ramírez — the candidate backed by both the Independence Party and MVC. If Dalmau achieves a strong second-place finish, displacing the pro-commonwealth PDP’s candidate, Rep. Jesús Manuel Ortiz González, it could signal the looming end of the political duopoly. “For the first time ever, there is a real legitimate chance that one of those two parties might not be in power in 2025,” said Alberto Medina, president of Boricuas Unidos en la Diáspora, which advocates for independence. How much of the slipping support for González-Colón can be traced to Bad Bunny’s opposition is unclear. (Unfortunately, he did not respond to our requests for comment.) But pro-statehood advocates have gone on the defense, alleging the superstar lives in the mainland rather than in Puerto Rico and therefore has no grounds for criticism. And the political fight between candidates is getting increasingly testy. Dalmau has hit González-Colón for her support of Trump and the RNC’s platform, which notably omits any specific reference to the territory's political status. González-Colón has linked Dalmau to communist regimes in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba. “Usually you don’t get that kind of rhetoric from the front runner unless they’re seeing something in their internal polls that leads them to attack personally the leader of the Alianza,” said Sergio Marxuach, policy director and general counsel at the Center for a New Economy.
| | | WHAT WE’RE WATCHING TODAY U.S. HOUSE
- Alabama: Democrat Shomari Figures faces off against Republican Caroleene Dobson for this redrawn 2nd Congressional District seat.
- Alaska: Incumbent Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola, who made history when she won her seat two years ago, faces a tough rematch against Republican Nick Begich.
- Michigan: This contest for the state’s 10th Congressional District was decided by roughly 1,600 votes in the midterm. Now, incumbent Republican Rep. John James takes on Democrat Carl Marlinga again.
- New York: Incumbent Republican Rep. Michael Lawler is trying to beat back a challenge in a swing district from Democratic former Rep. Mondaire Jones , who similarly lost his congressional seat after one term.
- Washington: There’s a rematch between incumbent Democratic Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp Perez and Republican Joe Kent. Their battle two years ago was one of the closest races in the nation.
U.S. SENATE
- Delaware: Democratic Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester is looking to make history as the first woman and first Black person to be elected to the Senate from the state.
- Maryland: Democrat Angela Alsobrooks is also looking to make history in Maryland. She’s facing a challenge for the open seat from popular Republican former Gov. Larry Hogan.
- Ohio: Incumbent Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown faces off against Republican businessman Bernie Moreno in one of the most closely watched races in the country.
- Texas: Democrats are hoping to deliver a shock on Election Day with Democratic Rep. Colin Allred, a former NFL linebacker, sacking incumbent Republican Sen. Ted Cruz.
BALLOT INITIATIVES
- California: Proposition 6 would remove prisons’ and jails' ability to force incarcerated people to work involuntarily, which opponents of the practice consider modern-day slavery.
- Again, California: Proposition 36 would roll back criminal justice reforms enacted a decade ago that prevented felony charges for thefts under $950 in value or possession of certain hard drugs like meth and fentanyl.
- New York: Voters will decide on a so-called Equal Rights Amendment , which is aimed at enshrining the right to abortion but also amends the state constitution's Equal Protection Clause to include "ethnicity, national origin, age, disability, and sex, including sexual orientation, gender identity and pregnancy."
- Colorado: With Amendment J, Colorado voters are being asked if they want to repeal the state’s constitutional definition of marriage as “a union of one man and one woman.”
| | | TODAY’S CULTURE RECS IN MEMORIAM: One of the most celebrated figures in modern music, Quincy Jones, has died at 91. Check out a phenomenal podcast he recorded called “Vinyl Me Please.” THE CLOSER: Lady Gaga closes out Harris’ final rally in Philly with a rendition of “God Bless America.” LETTER FROM PENNSYLVANIA: “What Black male celebrities are saying about Kamala Harris that she isn’t saying herself,” via our own Teresa Wiltz. Edited by Rishika Dugyala and Teresa Wiltz | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
