Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson is finalizing a new conflict-of-interest avoidance guide ahead of her gubernatorial campaign, as Republicans call for her to recuse herself from overseeing the 2026 election she will compete in.
Benson, a Democratic candidate for governor, has been developing the document for nearly a year with assistance from the Election Reformers Network, a progressive group that has developed recommendations to help secretaries of state build trust in elections when they are on the ballot.
Her office will finalize the plan in the coming weeks, spokesperson Angela Benander told Bridge Michigan.
The public wants to know, and we want to reassure them, Benander added.
It is unclear whether Benson will try to adopt formal rules to avoid any potential conflicts, or whether she will simply pledge new safeguards to ensure fair administration of an election her office will oversee. Benander said they are looking at the options we have within existing law.
But the forthcoming document could address at least some of the concerns raised by Republican gubernatorial candidates hoping to face Benson in the general election.
Republicans contend Democrat Jocelyn Benson should recuse herself from overseeing the 2026 election because she is running for governor.
Longtime election officials say their concerns are unfounded.
Bipartisan election officials say the system is designed to prevent undue political influence.
Last week, as he dropped off petition signatures to qualify for the August primary ballot, GOP gubernatorial candidate Perry Johnson suggested the federal government should be in charge of signature validation.
I just think that because we end up having the secretary of state in charge of her own election, that she ought to recuse herself, Johnson said, who was one of five candidates kept off the ballot in 2022 due to faulty signatures.
He went further on social media, arguing Benson must recuse herself from overseeing this election entirely.
Republican gubernatorial hopeful Perry Johnson argues Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson should recuse herself from overseeing this election because she is also a candidate for governor.
Benson's office called Johnson's suggestion of a federal takeover alarming and noted the federal government has no legal authority to run our elections.
But he is not alone. Fellow GOP candidate Aric Nesbitt has urged the US Department of Justice to oversee Michigans August primary and November general election, arguing Benson cannot be trusted to manage them.
But Democrats and Republican officials who have served at the center of Michigan election administration contend those claims misrepresent the electoral process and overstate Benson's role.
Whether its signature verification for candidates to get on the ballot or confirming vote tallies in November, the final sign-off on those weighty decisions rests with the Board of State Canvassers, a four-member bipartisan body.
Canvassers ultimately decide which candidates get on the ballot and certify election results, which are compiled by local election clerks across the state and are reviewed by county-level boards.
Citing those and other safeguards in the system, Benson's office has pushed back on GOP candidate claims about the fall elections.
Either these candidates for governor haven't bothered to take a few minutes to read and understand Michigan Election Law or they know they're spreading lies about the process, Benander, the state department spokesperson, said.
I don't think its a legitimate concern, said Republican Chair Richard Houskamp. Secretary Benson's nowhere near those signatures.
Democratic Vice Chair Mary Ellen Gurewitz agreed. Thats just bullshit, and they know it, she said of GOP candidates questioning the process. The secretary of state is not involved in signature verification. Never has been.
The Michigan Bureau of Elections, which is part of Benson's department but is staffed by nonpartisan civil service employees, reviews petition signatures submitted by candidates and recommends whether canvassers should certify them. Bureau of Elections Director Jonathan Brater serves as the boards secretary under state law.
Houskamp noted that during his tenure on the board, Benson has never attended a meeting of his board. It is an indication, to him, that the electoral system is working as intended.
As for vote counting, Michigan has a highly decentralized system. The state largely relies on the results submitted by municipal and county clerks and certified by county canvassers.
Even though those all route back to the Bureau of Elections, and we are the ones that certify the elections as the board of canvassers, Jocelyn Benson is not in a position to touch ballots or to handle signatures, Houskamp said.
Room for guardrails?
It is not just conservatives asking elected officials to consider conflicts of interest.
The progressive Election Reformers Network, which Benson's office is working with to develop conflict guidance, has advised officials that voters can worry about election officials overseeing their own races.
The group also notes that opposing candidates often exaggerate the risks for political gain.
The network recommends that secretaries of state who will be on the ballot determine what decisions they may have to make that could create or be perceived to create a way to help their own election or party.
Those officials should assess any legal and feasible steps they could take to reduce, suspend, or make more transparent their role in that decision.
And the resulting conflict-of-interest avoidance program should be made public, so it can help build voter confidence and demonstrate proactive effort to address voter concerns, the groups said.
Even if the assessment concludes that no options exist for secretaries to lawfully reduce their role in areas of potential conflict, that fact is important to make clear to voters.
Chris Thomas, who served as Michigans director of elections for 36 years under Republican and Democratic secretaries of state, said impugning the process is nothing new.
People grab on to it as just a way to take shots at their opponents, Thomas said. Asked about calls for the federal government to supervise Michigan elections, he let out a lengthy laugh.
Past secretaries of state have been candidates in elections they oversaw, including Benson's predecessor, Republican Ruth Johnson, who won a state senate race while serving as secretary of state in 2019.
Everyone has a boss, said Thomas, acknowledging state elections directors work under partisan secretaries of state. But those secretaries of state have avoided major conflict of interest allegations by leaving election-related tasks to civil service employees, he added.
The US is an outlier among Western nations, many of which do more to insulate the electoral process from political influence, leaving oversight of elections to a central board of civil service officials.
If somebody wants to make an argument we shouldnt have political appointees in the process, and has an idea about how else to do it — great, but just to use it as a stick to club someone with every four years, Thomas said.
Meanwhile, Bensons new rule allows her office to remove more inactive voter registrations from Michigans voter rolls.
Under the rule, Bensons office will begin the process of removing people from the voter rolls who havent voted in the past 20 or more years. They will receive a notice and have two federal election cycles to either confirm their status or vote before being removed from the states voter rolls.
In a video message, Benson said the rule will allow her to remove registrations she previously couldnt.
Many people who are registered choose not to vote, sometimes for several election cycles. In every election, a few thousand of these inactive voters do show up to vote for the first time in years. But others have moved away or passed away, and despite our repeated attempts to change Michigan law, we just did not have the legal tools to cancel those dormant, inactive records, she said.
According to Benson, her office has identified more than 2.1 million inactive registrations since 2019. 1.5 million have already been canceled and another 600,000 have been moved to inactive status.
Benson said the new rule shows that Michigan can have both high voter turnout and well-maintained voter rolls.
Canceling old registrations is not the only success story here, she said. Since I took office, over 2.4 million eligible Michiganders have registered to vote. That means were succeeding on both fronts, consistently adding new registered voters in accordance with the law, while taking outdated registrations off the books with a scalpel, not a sledgehammer.
But the rule has drawn criticism from Republicans who argue it gives Benson too much power to shape voter rolls before an election she will compete in.
And overseeing all of it is Benson, who is actively running for governor, with no statute requiring her recusal from the election rulemaking that will govern her own race.
The public hearing is May 22. Written comments to [email protected] can be submitted by 5 p.m. that day. What enters Michigans Administrative Code in the coming weeks will govern the November 2026 election.
This is not a technicality. It is a constitutional crisis in slow motion, the opinion piece stated.
I chair the House Election Integrity Committee. We have spent the past year tracking what the Michigan Department of State has done through the rulemaking process. Last year, Bensons MDOS submitted three election rule changes containing 40 provisions, many of which appear to violate federal law, state law and the Michigan Constitution.
The Michigan Fair Elections Institute documented this in its 195-page report, Compromised Checkpoints, released this month. Now, a fourth, Rule Set 2025-63 ST, has arrived with a public hearing on May 22, but with no explanation as to why its eight new rules are necessary.
That last point matters. Michigan law requires every rulemaking agency to publish an annual regulatory plan each year on July 1. Each plan is to report on issues and identify rules the agency intends to advocate for in the coming year. But the Department of States annual plan makes no mention of issues related to its newest proposal. No need was identified. No problem was announced. They just dropped this new rule set nine months past deadline with an expectation it be adopted right before the election.
When a rule set appears without explanation or justification, one question is reasonable: what is driving this change? A careful reading of the text makes the answer clear.
The new rules expand the Secretary of States authority beyond what state law allows. Rule 168.55(2) lets Bureau of Elections staff perform duties assigned to the Board of State Canvassers, even though the Board was created as an independent constitutional body and the Bureau director was intentionally made only a non-member secretary.
Rules 168.56 and 168.57 similarly reach into the internal operations of county and local clerks offices, even though state law gives the secretary of state authority to supervise clerk performance, not dictate office structure.
Rule 168.58 adds unnecessary definitions from unrelated laws, seemingly setting the stage for future rule changes before the public has a fair chance to weigh in. Together, these rules shift power away from independent election officials and toward a secretary of state with a clear conflict of interest.
This is how incremental regulatory expansion and executive branch overreach work.
Most rule changes are routine things. There is nothing routine about this. When looked at together, this is a clear attempt by Benson to expand her own control without legislative approval.
These rules were never passed by the Legislature. But the Michigan Constitution gives lawmaking power over elections to the Legislature and requires executive offices to be created by law. Administrative rules are meant to carry out laws, not create new powers. When bureaucrats use rulemaking to expand authority, they bypass the public accountability the Constitution requires.
Michigans rulemaking oversight process is broken, and Benson is taking advantage of it. The Michigan Office of Administrative Hearings and Rules reviews executive branch rules like these but was itself created by executive order, with no fixed terms, Senate confirmation or removal protections for its leaders. In other words, the office is meant to provide oversight answers to the same branch it is supposed to check. Michigans Fair Elections Institutes comparative research found that 23 other states with similar review offices have independent protections, while Michigan provides none.
A rule-review office that the governor can restructure or abolish at will does not provide independent oversight. It provides the appearance of oversight.
And overseeing all of it is Benson, who is actively running for governor, with no statute requiring her recusal from the election rulemaking that will govern her own race.
What enters Michigans Administrative Code in the coming weeks will govern the November 2026 election. Make your voice part of the record, the opinion concluded.