Mayor Duggan delivers a victory speech Nov. 7.
The governor's race in 2018 is far from over.
Candidates Bill Schuette and Gretchen Whitmer are running pretty even, according to a poll released by MIRS news service in Lansing two days after Mayor Mike Duggan coasted to victory.
The survey from Target/Insyght also shows Duggan 15 points up when matched against Schuette, the state's Republican attorney general.
Mind you, Duggan, 59, has always emphatically denied having plans to run for governor -- at least while serving as mayor.
Stephen Henderson, Detroit Free Press opinion editor, writes:
But even before the celebratory champagne ran out, talk that Duggan might run for the governor's seat in 2018 was back in full force, bolstered this time by results from a new poll, and frustrations among sitting Detroit City Council members with that body's current leadership, all of which could clear the runway for Duggan to advance on Lansing.
There are separate questions about whether Duggan should be governor, or whether he ought even run for the post, given that he was just re-elected mayor. They can be answered another time.
But the political dynamics at play suggest that a politician with Duggan’s ambition, vision and popularity may find it difficult to resist what looks like a prime opportunity.
