The gubernatorial election is still 14 months away, but Gov. Rick Snyder's re-election campaign has begun. When he first ran in 2010, Snyder billed himself as a businessman-not-a-politician and "nerd" who could cure what Michigan's ailment. In his newest ad, Snyder bills himself as a businessman-not-a-politician and nerd who cured what ailed Michigan.
Did he? Let's fact-check the ad.
The commercial begins with a quick montage of scary pictures from 2010 Detroit. Snyder used these same images in his 2010 campaign ads. Like the "before" pictures in a weight loss ad, Team Snyder is essentially saying that this is what Michigan used to look like before their guy fixed things.
The problem is, there are no "after" photos to show how Snyder turned the ugly duckling that is Michigan into a beautiful swan. So we took new photos of the same things, and then we added the terrifying sepia tone to match Snyder's ad.
The most obvious difference between the above images is the absence of that crumbling hulk in the foreground of the 2010 picture. Things must have been really awful before Rick Snyder became governor for a building to just rot away like that, right? Well, not quite.
That crumbling hulk was the Lafayette Building. At the time of that picture it was being demolished. The site was cleared nearly a year before Snyder took office. Prior to the arrival demo crews, it was a structurally sound, though vacant, building.
In its place is a public garden called Lafayette Greens, constructed by Compuware employees in 2011. According to the garden’s website: “The physical creation of the space demanded a great deal of groundwork and collaboration with various entities in Detroit, including the city of Detroit, its mayor and city council, as well as volunteers, neighbors and other local businesses.” No mention of state government or the Snyder administration.
There is another building missing in the 2013 photo. A work crew is currently finishing its demolition. Rick Snyder’s turnaround hasn’t changed one Michigan reality: Surface parking lots are still more valuable in Detroit’s central business district than office space.
This alley on the riverfront, just east of the Renaissance Center, looks exactly like it did in 2010. The only substantive difference is the trees currently have leaves. Because it's not winter.
This image represents a kind of a missed opportunity for Team Snyder. Henry Ford first learned to work with internal combustion engines while employed at the Dry Dock Engine Company inside the Globe Building on the east riverfront. The historic structure has been long vacant, but it's being renovated and will be reborn as a state DNR facility.
Crain's Detroit Business: The Detroit-based Roxbury Group will renovate the site in a build-to-suit development, said James Van Dyke, vice president of development for the firm.
The company will acquire the site for $1, complete the $12.8 million project and sell it to the state for about $11 million, Van Dyke said.
So, this one is just another picture of the Globe Building from a different perspective. The ugly vacant lot in the foreground of the 2010 picture remains an ugly vacant lot.
That's the visuals, but what about the words...
This new governor has kept his word, ignored politics, and produced incredible results.
"Right-to-work is an issue that is a very divisive issue. . . . We have many problems in Michigan that are much more pressing. . . . Right-to-work may have its time and place, but I don't believe it is appropriate in Michigan during 2012." – Rick Snyder, February 2012
"Freedom to work is all about creating more and better jobs in Michigan, and it's the next step for signaling to job creators and talented workers that Michigan is open for business, and that we're the best place in the country to live, work and play." – Rick Snyder, after signing Michigan’s right-to-work bill in December 2012
(mic drop)
Our one-and-a-half billion-dollar deficit, gone.
True. You might not like how Snyder balanced the budget, but your feelings are immaterial to this question. The claim is the budget is balanced and the budget is balanced.
Michigan’s economy, best in ten years.
The commercial cites Comerica Bank’s Economic Activity Index to make that claim. By the standards of that metric, the state’s economic activity ranks higher than it has since the early aughts.
However, Comerica’s chief economist Dana Johnson largely credits a national economic upswing for the healthier local situation: “Paralleling the national recovery, production variables remain the key driver to the Michigan recovery, with housing and employment lagging. Broad-based moderate gains in the national economy over the second half of the year should help generate an increasingly widespread recovery in Michigan, including moderate job growth.”
Best employment numbers in four years.
The commercial cites a March 28, 2013 Detroit News article to make that claim. At the time, the state’s unemployment rate was 8.8%. As of Sept. 20, the state's unemployment rate is 9.0%. Only Nevada, Illinois, and Rhode Island have worse jobless numbers. Still, unemployment is back down to the levels those halcyon days during Jennifer Granholm’s second term. Wait a second…
Coming soon, a return to vocational training, lower cost college degrees, and Michigan companies helping Michigan companies to produce great new jobs.
Let’s take the last part first. This is a nonsense phrase. Companies, in Michigan or otherwise, don’t produce jobs or help other companies produce jobs. They produce goods and services demanded in the marketplace. If production of goods and services requires labor, then workers may be hired. Businesses aren't charities and "job creation" isn't a care-with-me, share-with-me activity.
The stuff about vocational training and lower college costs refers to a to-be-announced initiative. Worth noting, however, is that in the meantime Michigan universities raised tuition prices by an average of 3.45% this year. Wayne State’s tuition has increased at double the rate of inflation over the last quarter-century. That includes an 8.9% increase for the 2013-14 school year.
We’ll never be 50th out of 50 again.
Because we are 47th out of 50 in unemployment!
In the end, there is nothing in the ad that one could reasonably call an outright lie, but it is a slickly packaged collection of cherry-picked factoids that paint an oversimplified and overly cheery picture of Michigan's current health and prosperity. In other words, it's a pretty typical campaign ad from a guy who seems to be a more typical politician than he'd have us to believe.
