Who is GLEP and why are they sending malicious mailers into Washtenaw County?

In any tight election, the final two weeks of the race are always the most heated. That’s when voters start paying the closest attention and when all the strangest twists occur in the campaigns.

That's exactly what appears to be happening the Michigan Senate race between Rebekah Warren (our endorsed candidate) and Pam Byrnes. The Ghost of Elections Past --- The DeVos name --- is reappearing to haunt Washtenaw County in the form of malicious mailers against Warren, hidden under the thin sheet of a front organization known as the “Great Lakes Education Project” (GLEP).

Betsy DeVos, the former chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party, founded the Great Lakes Education Project in 2001 and the DeVos family continues to fund it.  

Why is the DeVos clan interested in a heavily contested Washtenaw County Democratic primary race?  The sad answer is that GLEP actively plays in races where they feel they have a chance to defeat candidates who are pro-public education and pro-environmental protection. The idea is to push for a more conservative alternative to support GLEP's platform.

If the education platform of GLEP and the DeVos family isn’t enough to raise large questions among the average Washtenaw County resident, we remind you that this is the same family that has funded a group to scuttle the climate talks at Kyoto, advocated for weakening regulations on large-scale livestock and poultry processing factories, and even funded a conservative Michigan think tank that supports the concepts of selling state parks and drilling in the Great Lakes.

Photo credit: westmichiganpolitics.blogspot.com