‘Familiar-face fatigue’ hits McManus family, incumbents across Northern Michigan

Incumbents were ousted across Northern Michigan in Tuesday’s primary.

This Traverse City Record-Eagle editorial titled “Voters not accepting status quo” explains:

The themes of the day appeared to be change and accountability — with some familiar-face fatigue thrown in for good measure.

Outside Traverse City, in Garfield Township, which by population is the largest local government in Northern Michigan, the competition for positions was the stiffest in decades, and Supervisor Lee Wilson was voted out of office after 32 years.

Ray Franz of Onekama surprised many by beating Mike McManus of Lake Leelanau in the Republican primary for the 101st district.

Some attributed his loss to his move to create an unadvertised and handsomely paid “deputy supervisor” position for Joe McManus, who is related to the former township treasurer Judy McManus, longtime state Sen. George McManus and current state Sen. Michelle McManus. Joe is also related to Mike McManus, the heavily favored candidate for the Republican nomination in the state House race in the 101st district, who also lost.

In what has been called the biggest surprise of the Northern Michigan primary, Mike McManus — the best funded of the Republican candidates and father of Michelle McManus, who represents the same area in the state Senate — a man with one of the best known names in Michigan Republican politics — lost to Bear Lake grocery store owner Ray Franz by nine votes.

West Michigan Rising has some interesting discussion of this development.

Franz, a candidate to the right of McManus who now faces off against Democratic environmental lawyer Dan Scripps of Leland in the general election, told the Record Eagle when asked about Scripps, “He’s going to be hard to beat.”