Opinion

Absentee ballots, early voting sites offer options for primary

At a time when voting by mail has been increasingly challenged — President Donald Trump has repeatedly leveled unfounded claims of fraud against absentee ballots, including in his prime-time speech a week ago in which he called them “inherently corrupt” — state election officials this week said more Michigan voters are opting to use this method this summer. With two weeks left before the Aug. 4 primary election, 572,553 Michigan voters had already cast their ballot, according to data publicly available on the relaunched Michigan Voting Dashboard, mi.gov/votingdashboard. Voter ...

Almanac for June 23, 2026

Today is Thursday, July 23, the 204th day of 2026. There are 161 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: In 1967, deadly rioting erupted in Detroit as an early morning police raid on an unlicensed bar resulted in a confrontation with local residents that led to five days of violence and resulted in 43 deaths. Also on this date: In 1903, the Ford Motor Company sold its first car, a Model A, for $850. In 1958, Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II named the first four women to peerage in the House of Lords. In 1982, actor Vic Morrow and two child actors, 7-year-old Myca Dinh ...

Editorial cartoon for July 23, 2026

Support for public transportation

When people ask why I support the DATA Millage, I think back to the times it helped my family and me. In 1997, after surgery, I needed physical therapy and had no one nearby to drive me. DATA got me to every appointment and made my recovery possible. Later, as a working mother, I used it to get my children to scheduled activities, and I appreciated knowing they would be picked up and dropped off safely. Years later, when my mother came to live with me after being diagnosed with bone cancer and later needed a wheelchair, DATA helped her get to medical appointments and community activities ...

Workers not uniting behind DSA

What did the country ever do to white college graduates to make them feel so disaffected from its economic and political system? The wave of socialist victories in Democratic primaries is being driven by well-educated white voters who are more extreme than the rest of the Democratic ...

House votes for Department of War renaming as part of defense bill

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House on Wednesday passed a defense policy bill that incorporates President Donald Trump’s request for a historic $1.15 trillion in spending for national security and that would designate the Department of Defense as the Department of War. It also would provide for a ...