DETROIT, Mich. — Below the marquee races for U.S. Senate and governor, Michigan voters on Tuesday will also fill two seats on the state Supreme Court and two seats on the State Board of Education, contests that every voter in the state sees on the ballot.
Six candidates are competing for the two Supreme Court seats, and the top two vote-getters win. The race appears in the nonpartisan section of the ballot, with no party labels next to the names, even though the candidates were nominated at party conventions over the summer.
Democrats nominated the two incumbents. Justice Megan Cavanagh was first elected in 2018, and Justice Noah Hood, appointed by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in 2025, is seeking his first full term. Republicans nominated two sitting trial judges, Casandra Morse-Bills of the 23rd Judicial Circuit and Michael D. Warren Jr. of the 6th Circuit Court. Thomas Howe and Jody White are on the ballot as the picks of the U.S. Taxpayers Party.
Control of the court is not on the line this year. Democratic nominees hold a 6-1 majority on the seven-member bench and have held the majority since 2020, so even a Republican sweep of both seats would leave them in the minority until at least 2028. The last time a Republican nominee won a seat on the court was 2018.
The education board race is crowded. Eleven candidates are seeking two of the eight seats on the State Board of Education, which is elected statewide. Democrats renominated incumbents Judith Pritchett and Tiffany Tilley, and Republicans nominated Terence Collins and Bree Moeggenberg. Also running are Wissam Charafeddine of the Green Party, Libertarian Charles Essner, Kelli Monroe of the Natural Law Party, William Mohr II and Christine Schwartz of the U.S. Taxpayers Party, Mary Anne Hering of the Working Class Party and independent Jennifer Strickland. The board does not hold primaries; nominees come from party conventions.
The same statewide ballot also carries races for lieutenant governor, attorney general and secretary of state, along with two seats each on the governing boards of Michigan State University, the University of Michigan and Wayne State University.
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Filed under: Lansing MI Politics News
