The Michigan Republican Party released an ad this week discouraging Michiganders from reelecting tyrannical Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) after a recent audit report revealed her administration had seriously underreported the number of nursing home residents who died from COVID.
“Michigan can’t afford 4 more years,” reads a caption at the opening of the minute-long video rebuke, as it features Whitmer speaking about her coronavirus policies saving “a lot of lives in our nursing homes.”
In its audit report, made public this month, the Michigan Auditor General Office said it “updated its reconciliation” of coronavirus deaths linked to nursing homes and found the number of deaths as of July 2, 2021, was 42 percent higher than what the Whitmer administration had reported: 8,061 deaths compared with the previous count of 5,675.
Whitmer defended her policy, claiming in a CNN interview last year that it “saved a lot of lives,” and Auditor General Doug Ringler clarified that he felt the discrepancy amounted to a “difference” in reporting rather than an intentional “underreporting.”
But Republicans such as State Sen. Aric Nesbitt described the policy as “inexplicable” and “reckless,” and the Republican group Michigan Rising Action called Whitmer the “Cuomo of the Midwest” because of it.