COMPILED BY JN STAFF

Michigan voters will 
elect a new U.S. 
senator this year. 
The two major party 
candidates resond to 
questions from the JN.

DECISION 
2024
W

hen Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow announced her retirement, she left her 
seat up for grabs in this election cycle. Two candidates are vying for her job: 
former Republican Congressman Mike Rogers, who represented Michigan’s 
eighth district from 2001 to 2015, and current Congresswoman Elissa Slotkin, who 
represents Michigan’s seventh district and has served in the Congress since 2019. The 
winner in November will serve in the Senate for six years.
The Jewish News sent each candidate a slate of questions, asking only that 
they didn’t say anything negative about their opponent. Here are 
their answers.

8 | OCTOBER 24 • 2024 J
N

ELISSA SLOTKIN

Representative Elissa Slotkin serves the residents of Michigan’s 
Seventh Congressional District, which includes all of Ingham, Livingston, 
Shiawassee and Clinton counties, as well as parts of Eaton, Genesee and 
Oakland counties.
After earning her undergraduate degree at Cornell University, she 
attended graduate school at Columbia University in New York City, arriving 
on campus just days before the Sept. 11 attacks. That experience started 
her on the path to a career in national security, and after grad school, she 
joined the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) as an intelligence analyst. 
At the CIA, she worked alongside the military during three tours in 
Iraq. In between those tours, she held various defense and intelligence 
positions under President Bush and President Obama. In 2011, she took a 
senior position at the Pentagon and rose to serve as an acting assistant 
secretary of defense until January 2017. 
She has served in Congress since 2019 and is the proud owner of two 
rescue dogs, Rocky and Boomer. 

MIKE ROGERS 

After graduating from Howell High School and Adrian College, 
Rogers served as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army. Following his time 
in the Army, he served in the FBI, taking down organized crime and 
public corruption in Chicago.
In 1994, he ran for the Michigan Senate. As a state senator, he 
wrote the legislation that created Michigan’s 529 College Savings 
Program.
In 2000, he ran for U.S. Congress and won. On the House Energy 
and Commerce Committee, he worked to secure our nations’ energy 
independence and unleash American-made energy. As chairman of 
the House Intelligence Committee, he was among the first to sound 
the alarm on the economic and national security danger posed by 
China. 
He retired from Congress in 2015 and entered the private sector. 
He is married to his wife, Kristi, and has two grown children.

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CANDIDATES?

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