Meet Mike Duggan: Candidate for Michigan Governor

May 21 update: Mike Duggan has withdrawn from the Michigan gubernatorial race.

Editor’s note: Michigan Farm Bureau has coordinated with the candidates for Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat and the gubernatorial race to provide their responses to four questions to help you learn more about the candidate, their background, and agriculture-related views. In the interest of fairness and objectivity, staff did not write or edit the candidates’ submissions. Each profile is presented as submitted by the candidates.

U.S. Senate Candidates: Mallory McMorrow, Mike Rogers, and Haley Stevens

Candidates for Governor: Jocelyn Benson, Mike Cox, Mike Duggan, John James, Perry Johnson, Aric Nesbitt, Ralph Rebandt, and Kim Thomas

Mike Duggan – Independent Candidate for Governor

In your words, tell us who you are and why you’re the ideal candidate for Michigan governor. 

I’m not running to move Michigan left or right, I’m running to reverse its decades-long slide and make it work by:

• Fixing education: My plan lifts Michigan into the top tier on literacy and guarantees every student a skill or credential.
• Lowering the cost of living and doing business: I’ll tackle energy costs, insurance, and housing so families and employers can stay and grow here.
• Improving infrastructure and permitting: I’ll push more predictable and timely processes without unnecessary red tape.
• Ending “pendulum politics”: I’ll build durable, bipartisan consensus on core goals so policies don’t change every time power changes hands.

What do you believe is the most pressing issue facing Michigan residents today, and what specific policies would you pursue as governor to address it?

The biggest problem is that Michigan families feel like they are falling behind no matter how hard they work. That shows up in two ways: the cost of living is rising faster than wages, and our education and workforce systems are not reliably preparing our kids for good-paying jobs.

The best solution is a combined economic and education strategy:

• On costs: Focus state policy on lowering energy bills, housing costs, health-care expenses, and the price of food, as well as on improving roads and infrastructure so people and goods can move efficiently.
• On opportunity: Make sure every student can read by 4th grade, make CTE and apprenticeship pathways as visible and valued as four-year colleges, and create jobs that embrace both the technologies of tomorrow and our heritage as a manufacturing and agricultural powerhouse.

If we give families a fair shot—stable costs and real opportunity—Michigan will grow again.

Michigan agriculture is a major driver of the state’s economy and rural communities. What do you see as the greatest challenge facing Michigan farmers today, and how would your administration help address it?

The industry is being squeezed nationally by market and tariff forces, while the State of Michigan makes things even worse. The failure of EGLE to have adequate, trained staff for permit reviews and enforcement, the lack of consistent and understandable regulations, and the lack of any meaningful appeals process threatens the viability of too many Michigan farms. And then there’s the ever-changing regulations, hostility to economic growth (e.g., prohibiting processors from expanding), and nonsupport of agricultural workforce development, all of which make it clear that the State is failing our farmers.

Here are steps I would take as Governor:

• Fair and predictable regulation: Clear, science-based rules on water, nutrients, and livestock siting, with streamlined processes and timelines you can plan around.
• Reform EGLE: I’ll improve EGLE’s structure and workforce with proper staffing levels, better training, and a more customer service-oriented approach so that decisions are made consistently, fairly, and swiftly.
• Competitive operating costs: Energy, insurance, and transportation costs directly hit farm margins. State policy on energy planning, transmission, and large new loads must consider the impact on ratepayers, including farms.
• Workforce and succession: Strengthen ag-related CTE, apprenticeships, and community college partnerships so the next generation of farmers, operators, vets, and agronomists is ready—and help younger farmers access land and capital to keep operations in family hands.
• Treat agriculture as an economic development priority for MEDC: Expansion of food processing capacity and other agriculture-related businesses will be made high-priority economic development initiatives.

Michigan farmers depend on both a strong economy and healthy natural resources. How would you work to balance agricultural productivity, environmental stewardship, and regulatory certainty for landowners?

The farmers I talk to care deeply about land and water—they live on it and plan to pass it on. And the environmental folks I talk to recognize that working lands can be part of the solution. But Michigan has never had a leader with the bipartisan credibility needed to move the two groups together towards balanced and durable solutions.

As Michigan’s first independent Governor, I’ll be uniquely situated to drive that collaboration by bringing all sides together and:

• Focus on outcomes, not mandates: Use voluntary conservation programs, cost-share, and data-driven metrics to reward practices that improve soil health and water quality, rather than a penalizing one-size-fits-all approach.
• Insist on Michigan-specific science: Base decisions on Michigan data and conditions—not talking points from national activist groups—to keep standards fair and grounded in the same reality that our farmers and operators face every day.

Balanced solutions come when both sides feel heard and when the state is honest: we want clean water, healthy land, and viable farms, and we’re going to design policies that make all three possible while growing our economy.