# Poll: Michigan voters approve of Gov. Whitmer with 51.5% backing ahead of November
LANSING, Mich. -- A new statewide poll released Tuesday shows that a narrow majority of Michigan voters approve of the job being done by Governor Gretchen Whitmer as she approaches the November 2026 general election.
The WDIV/Detroit News survey found that 51.5% of respondents approve of the governor's job performance, while 43.1% disapprove. The remaining 5.4% of respondents answered neither, said they did not know, or refused to answer.
Breaking down the approval numbers, 21.1% of voters said they strongly approve of the governor's job performance and another 30.4% said they somewhat approve. On the disapproval side, 30.1% of voters said they strongly disapprove of the job being done by the governor, while 13.0% said they somewhat disapprove.
The exact wording of the question asked of voters over the phone was: "Do you approve or disapprove of the job being done by Gretchen Whitmer as Governor of Michigan?"
The poll is the latest in a series of surveys that Michigan voters have seen as the November general election approaches. The results place the governor's approval rating in a modest but stable range, with the approval and disapproval numbers separated by roughly 8 percentage points.
Poll methodology
WDIV and the Detroit News commissioned the survey of likely voters in Michigan's November 2026 general election. The poll was conducted by The Glengariff Group, Inc.
It was a 600-sample, live-operator telephone survey conducted from Aug. 31 through Sept. 3, 2026. The margin of error is +/-4.0% at a 95% level of confidence.
Of the respondents, 15.0% were reached by landline telephone and 85.0% were reached by cellphone.
The approval reading for the governor comes as she nears the end of her tenure. In recent weeks, the governor has been in the public spotlight as she marked her final annual Mackinac Bridge Walk and visited Kalamazoo to highlight state education funding, including the free school meal program she signed into the state's education budget this summer.
The polling will likely be watched closely in the run up to the November 2026 general election.
Reporting: WDIV/Detroit News poll data via The Glengariff Group, Inc.