B
y now, all of you should
have received your
at-home ballots in the
mail for the upcoming election.
Whether you are voting by mail
or planning a
masked, socially
distanced in-per-
son trip to the
polls on Nov. 3,
we at the JN have
been busy over
the last few weeks
preparing our
coverage so that you are pre-
pared to mark your ballots.
Typically, in an election year,
the JN will either send candi-
dates a written questionnaire
of their stance on the issues, or
conduct a sit-down interview
in our offices. This year, with
in-person meetings off the
table, our editorial team still
pushed for face-to-face inter-
views, but we have conducted
these interviews over Zoom.
We focused our questioning
on issues of particular impor-
tance to the local Jewish commu-
nity, including rising antisemi-
tism, support for Israel, the state
and federal responses to the
COVID-19 pandemic, health-
care, the local economy and race
relations. Incumbents were asked
about their past records and
accomplishments. We then edit-
ed the transcripts for length and
clarity in order to present their
views fairly and accurately.
In all, we have interviewed
18 different candidates running
in a total of 13 different races,
from Senate and Congress to
various Michigan statehouse
and Oakland County positions.
These races are largely being
overlooked by other media
this election cycle, as the lion’
s
share of coverage is being
poured into the presidency. We
couldn’
t interview every candi-
date on the ballot, but we tried
to prioritize the races of great-
est consequence to our readers.
In the most high-profile
Michigan race, the U.S. Senate,
we are also publishing a feature
on Republican Senate candidate
John James and his Jewish con-
nections. We did this because
I felt these connections were
interesting, had not previously
been reported and were worth
our time to explore. Our goal
is not to play favorites between
the candidates but rather to
illuminate the Jewish stakes of
this very tight race. Sen. Peters
has written op-eds for the JN
before and is more familiar to
our readers, while James has
been less forthcoming with our
publication despite this being
his second Senate campaign.
Not all of our election cov-
erage fit into this print issue,
so please visit our website,
TheJewishNews.com, for more
of our candidate interviews.
The interviews and sub-
sequent stories were a com-
bined effort between myself;
JN Associate Editor Jackie
Headapohl; Copy Editor
David Sachs; Reporter Danny
Schwartz; and JN freelance
writer Madeline Halpert.
Freelancer Sarah Williams pro-
vided invaluable assistance on
editing candidate transcripts.
The following candidates,
all Republicans, did not return
our repeated requests for inter-
views or questionnaires, and
as such are not featured in our
elections coverage even though
their opponents are:
• Paul Junge (8th Cong.
Dist.)
• Charles Langworthy (9th
Cong. Dist.)
• Jeff Jones (12th Cong.
Dist.)
• Robert Vance Patrick (14th
Cong. Dist.)
• Elizabeth Goss (MI-27)
• Mitch Swoboda (MI-37)
• Rep. Ryan Berman (MI-39)
• Kendra Cleary (MI-40)
One final note. In the past,
the JN has offered candidate
endorsements. Just like during
the August primary, we will not
be doing so for this election.
Our new nonprofit owner-
ship status complicates our
ability to formally endorse
political candidates, but even
if we weren’
t in that situation,
I would still decline to have
our publication endorse any-
one.
My reasoning is: I don’
t
believe media endorsements are
a useful metric in our modern
political dialogue, when so few
voters remain undecided, and
particularly not for our publi-
cation, where we have a small
editorial staff and risk compro-
mising our reporting by issuing
endorsements. We believe our
role in this election is to give
the candidates the chance to
speak to Metro Detroit’
s Jewish
voters directly and give you
the tools to make up your own
minds.
We hope the information
contained in these pages and
online does give you those
tools, and that we have suc-
ceeded in representing your
voice to your elected officials.
Have a healthy and safe elec-
tion!
Your Vote
Counts!
Editor’
s Note
Andrew
Lapin
Editor
12 | OCTOBER 15 • 2020