Michigan Republicans hold Benson in contempt over election training information

Budget bill passage renews Medicaid cut concerns

The passage of President Trump’s so-called “Big Beautiful Bill” has renewed concerns about cuts to Medicaid. Democratic State Representative Noah Arbit and Republican State Senator Jim Runestad debate the impact, and The Pulse takes your questions to an Elder Law Attorney.

(FOX 2) - Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson was held in contempt after the state House approved steps to sue her office on Thursday.

The Republican-controlled House subpoenaed Benson in April for training materials that had been distributed to officials for running the state's elections. 

Big picture view:

A resolution holding Benson in contempt cleared the Michigan House along party lines Thursday by a 58-47 vote.

It's the latest escalation between the feuding groups over Michigan's elections as Republicans have sought the materials given to election clerks by the secretary of state.

The original subpoena followed months of requests from the GOP for more information about how Benson was instructing election officials to conduct voting.

State Rep. Jay DeBoyer, the chairman of the House Oversight Committee, has led the charge. He has characterized the requested information as "basic election training materials."

"We're not talking about state secrets here," he said after issuing the subpoena. 

The other side:

According to Benson, the mistrust in Michigan's election system is rooted in investigations like the one that Republicans are carrying out.

"This is no way to govern a state," she said Thursday. "This is dangerous governance because this rhetoric, this cruelty, this lying, will directly influence people to harm hardworking state and local election officials who are simply trying to do their job."

While arguing she believes in transparency, she said "you cannot bully me or abuse your authority to get access to information that, if it ends up in the wrong hands, could be used to interfere with the chain of custody of ballots, tamper with election equipment, or impersonate a clerk on election day."

She added her team would be willing to sit down with elected officials, adding they have released over 3,300 pages of documents to the committee. 

However, she promised to "see them in court" if they didn't back down. 

In the middle:

At issue in the feud are materials that Benson's department has given to clerks for running elections. 

While taking questions from reporters, Benson said the documents that have been withheld are to redact sensitive information. Benson said the information is for clerks to have and not for politicians.

"That's the line of information we're talking about here. Information that contains secure data about the operations of our elections."