Donald Trump Could Win This Blue State in November

Yesterday, we made the case that Donald Trump could win Michigan, despite the fact that no Republican candidate for resident has won in the Wolverine State since 1988. 

Today, two more items have surfaced confirming Trump’s surge in the union-heavy traditionally Blue state: the announcement that 100 Syrian and Iraqi refugees would be placed in troubled and nearly bankrupt Flint, Michigan, without consultation with or the consent of local authorities, and the release of a Detroit Free Press poll showing that 53 percent of the Great Lake State’s voters oppose settling more refugees in the hard-pressed state.

According to this FY 2017 abstract submitted to the Department of State by Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service, which operates in Michigan as Samaritas, the resettlement agency plans to bring 100 Iraqi and Syrian refugees to Flint, Michigan, in the 12-month fiscal year that begins in less than three weeks. The document was obtained by Breitbart’s Michael Patrick Leahy in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request from the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services.

But that plan appears to violate a clause in the federal Refugee Act of 1980, reports Leahy, which requires the federal government and director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement to consult with local as well as state governments prior to the placement of any refugees within their boundaries.

“At this point it appears city leaders have not been informed of the details regarding this matter,” a spokesperson for Mayor Karen Weaver and the city of Flint told Breitbart News.

It’s the same story with the government of Genesee county, in which Flint is located.

“As of this time, the Genesee County Board of Commissioners has not been notified of any settlement of 100 refugees from Middle East/South Asia,” Jamie Curtis, Chairman of the Genesee County Board of Commissioners, told Breitbart News through a spokesperson.

The resettlement agencies, or voluntary agencies (VOLAGs) which receive more than $1 billion annually in federal funds to resettle refugees in the United States, have become increasingly sophisticated at hiding increases in resettled refugees from state and local governments until after they arrive, reports Leahy.

This follows the pattern identified in other states where private “refugee resettlement” organizations place refugees in communities without the consultation required by law and often for blatantly political purposes, as in the case of large refugee populations suddenly dropped in the middle of the districts of congressional opponents of Obama’s “refugee resettlement” policies.

What’s more, troubled Flint is at best an unlikely place to place shell-shocked refugees. As Leahy reports:

Flint has an unemployment rate of 10.8% compared to 5.4% in Michigan and 4.9% nationally.

Flint has the third highest unemployment in Michigan, after Detroit at 12.5% and Pontiac at 11.1%.

The median household income in Flint is $26,179.

The housing market is bleak with a backlog of 1,792 foreclosures and a median sales price of $12,600. Vacant property is 24.5% of all housing, rentals are 37.6% and owned is 37.9%.

The crime rate is 47.34% higher than national average, sex offenders are 80.25% higher than national average and schools rate below national average.

Placing refugees here seems like a great strategy for producing a second generation of alienated and unemployable candidates for jihad, much the same as those that inhabit the Muslim no-go zones of European countries, such as Belgium, France and the U.K.

All of this has caused deep resentment in a state, and especially in a community like Flint, hard hit by globalization.

And this resentment is now beginning to affect voter attitudes in Michigan’s presidential election.

A poll released yesterday found that Republican Donald Trump has cut deeply into Democrat Hillary Clinton’s post-convention lead, with an exclusive new Free Press/WXYZ-TV poll showing Trump has moved closer to tying Clinton in a state that hasn’t backed a Republican nominee since 1988.

Clinton, whose lead in some national polls also has disappeared lately after a successful convention this summer in Philadelphia, still leads Trump 38%-35% in Michigan, according to the poll done by Lansing-based EPIC-MRA for the Free Press, WXYZ-TV (Channel 7) and their out-state partners. But that is within the poll’s 4-percentage-point margin of error, and a significant drop from her 11-point lead last month, according to an analysis by Todd Spangler of the Detroit Free Press.

But the real bombshell for Hillary Clinton is the poll’s findings on Michigan voters’ attitudes on refugee resettlement.

In the 600 voter survey, 53 percent opposed increasing the number of refugees admitted to the United States, while only 36 percent favored an increase in admissions.

The intensity of the local opposition to the resettlement of refugees in Michigan is one of several factors that has now turned that usually reliable blue state into the toss-up category in the November presidential election between Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Clinton vigorously supports increasing the number of refugees resettled in the United States above the FY 2016 ceiling of 85,000, and recently said she wants to increase the number of Syrian refugees resettled in the United States from the 10,000 originally planned for FY 2016 to 65,000.

Donald Trump, in contrast, opposes increasing the annual number of refugees resettled in the United States.

In a state hard-hit by unemployment caused by globalization, importing thousands of unemployable or low-skilled “refugees” makes no sense to voters, who are looking for someone to champion their economic and cultural interests. Hillary Clinton has clearly put herself on the other side of that battle and that is a major reason why Donald Trump is surging in Michigan.