GOP governor’s race brings out harsher side of Lt. Gov. Brian Calley
And when Gov.
But as the
Calley and Attorney General
At a debate
Schuette has repeatedly called Calley a liar and suggested he wants to "sweep ... under the rug" the Snyder administration's failings on Flint. "You go around this state making false accusations," Schuette told Calley at the
The tone is a departure for Calley, but the all-out nature of the campaign is not. Calley, who hasn't lost an election since he ran for student council president in ninth grade, plays to win.
"I don't like to leave anything on the table," said Calley, who trails Schuette by double digits in recent public opinion polls in a four-candidate race.
Details are scarce about that ninth-grade student council race, except that Calley was vanquished by a girl he'd earlier escorted to the
A month before the 2016 election, Calley renounced his endorsement of President
Not strong talking points for winning a Republican primary.
And just as Calley and his campaign have attacked Schuette for a lack of transparency and allegedly using his state-funded office for campaign work and private real estate deals, the attorney general and his backers have responded in kind.
Despite all this, Calley, 41, of
On his support for Snyder policies not popular with the party base, Calley said
In an interview with the
As for the other attacks from Sandler, "he's just trying to divert attention from the problems that his candidate has," Calley said.
Why so optimistic? By his own account, Calley, a physician's son who was born in
"The thing I've noticed about luck is -- it's like the old saying -- the harder I work, the more that I seem to have," Calley said. "What I try to do is make the most of every single opportunity."
At
"We met in choir class and she would not give me the time of day," said Calley, who initially was too shy to ask her out in any case.
But as chance or fate would have it, Calley and his future wife were cast in the two lead roles in the high school musical "Little Shop of Horrors," about a skid-row flower shop owner and his man-eating plant. Calley played Seymour, portrayed by
Then, "she had no choice but to get to know me," Calley recalled.
The play included a kiss between the two leads, which in a school production meant Calley dipping Powell back out of the view of the audience and faking it. But on the last night, when Calley dipped Powell, she reached up and kissed him on the lips.
Once the curtain went down, "he said, 'was that an accident, or was that on purpose?' "
From there, Calley "demonstrated his work ethic to me when he decided my existing boyfriend had to go," she said.
"He's almost an old-soul type,"
Calley would write letters to congressman and
"Every one he got, regardless of the party, he framed and hung on his bedroom wall."
Calley arranged to finish high school a semester early so he could start college at the same time Julie did, though in a different city.
The next year, Calley found a way to access the high school auditorium on a weekend, set out the props for that same musical, and proposed to her on stage. They married in 1996.
While in high school, Calley, who had earlier done filing at his dad's office and worked as a janitor at a nursing home, got a job in the mail room of a local bank, with no particular career plan in mind. He cycled through a range of jobs involving increasing responsibility and said the time he spent working a teller window cured him of his shyness. When he left the job a little more than 10 years later, he was vice president of commercial banking.
In 2002, when Calley contacted his county commissioner, the late
"He's a very, very sharp guy" and "he was a big asset to the board," said the current chairman,
Calley received a bachelor's degree from MSU in 1998, a master's degree in business administration from
It's not that the Calleys, who settled in
Calley has also faced tough primary battles. He triumphed in a seven-way
State Rep.
"We all were beat down and dragged out" and wanted to skip a parade where Calley was scheduled to appear in a small town in
Calley's wife followed her husband into politics, first to the
Though he's endorsed by Snyder, Calley has faced criticism from traditional administration allies such as the
The "Clean Michigan" initiative was intended to galvanize grassroots support for Calley running as an anti-establishment outsider and government reformer. But among other issues, there were problems with the petition wording and a firm hired to collect signatures for the drive had a company officer with an earlier conviction for election fraud. Calley eventually handed off leadership of the drive, which spent
"It's not unusual for an initiative to ... not get to the point where it gets all its signatures," Calley said.
Another problem for Calley emerged in February, when the
The state initially approved the grant to
Calley, who said Wednesday he won't return donations he received from
Calley is also facing questions after he and a fund-raising consultant paid by his campaign,
Said Sandler, "Calley's disturbing habit of mixing official state business with campaign fundraising is unethical, troubling and potentially illegal."
Calley said Dickow accompanies him on nearly all campaign visits in metro
Though more than 70 pardon applications were submitted from the Chaldean community, only seven cases received hearings in March in front of the Michigan Parole Board, said
Snyder has delegated significant responsibilities to Calley, in areas such as tax policy, regulatory reform, health care and developmental disabilities.
Calley also led trade missions on Snyder's behalf to
Political analyst
Recently, Calley pushed hard to send MSU to prompt mediation with former sports doctor
But for the most part, Calley is running on the Snyder record.
It remains to be seen whether that is a viable strategy. There's no question the state's economy and unemployment rate have improved markedly since Snyder and Calley took office in 2011. But while Snyder's numbers have recovered somewhat since the darkest days of the Flint drinking water crisis,a recent poll by EPIC-MRA of
"If you owned a sports team and they went from worst to first, would you fire the coaches, or hire them for another season?" Calley asked in a recent fund-raising mailer sent to
"The 'Michigan Comeback' didn't happen by accident. And if you want to keep it going, I ask you to look closely at the team that helped to put the right policies in place to bring our state back from the brink."
Contact
Roads: A 2015 road funding plan Calley supported, which will put an extra
Auto insurance: Says legislative efforts to date have failed because too many elements were loaded onto a single piece of legislation, meaning most everyone could find a reason to oppose it. Instead, he prefers addressing the issues tactically, in separate bills. Says any fee schedules must be coupled with assurances of timely payments.
School safety: It's up to local districts to decide whether teachers should be armed. Expand the OK2SAY confidential tip program to 24/7, every day of the year, and make sure every report is properly followed up on.
Pension tax: Would not repeal the pension tax but would support a higher personal deduction for seniors. The principle is that all pension income should be treated equally, which was not the case before the 2012 law removing exemptions for certain pension income took effect.
Legalized marijuana: Supports medical marijuana use but does not favor legalization of recreational marijuana.
Medicaid work requirement: Supports in principle, but wants to study the details to make sure "whatever rules we settle on apply equally across the state."
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