.png#keepProtocol)
Lansing — The state of Michigan is spending an initial $30,000 on advertising appealing to residents in Republican-led states, attempting to woo them into moving to a state where their “fundamental human freedoms” are protected.
The digital ad campaign, which launched last week, is being deployed in South Carolina, Florida, Indiana, Texas, Georgia and Tennessee, according to the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. At least four of those states are among the fastest growing in population in the country during the past year, according to a nonprofit group.
The state’s economic development agency launched the ad campaign using business marketing funds as part of its efforts to recruit workers for new and existing businesses, MEDC spokesman Otie McKinley said.
The campaign, McKinley said, is part of a “concerted effort to attract talent and business to Michigan by highlighting a business-friendly environment that also protects people’s rights and freedoms.”
“These digital ads in target markets are all about promoting people and personal rights here in Michigan while also highlighting attributes of living, working and thriving in Michigan,” McKinley said.
The campaign comes as Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer focuses on increasing the state’s stagnant population of 10 million residents and promoting the voter-approved expansion of abortion rights and the Democratic-controlled Legislature’s passage of new laws protecting gay, lesbian and transgender residents from discrimination in employment and housing.
Michigan’s commercial campaign also follows a Florida Republican group’s attack on Whitmer’s policies earlier this year that played up the southern state’s right-to-work law of Michigan’s repeal of its own right-to-work law.
The MEDC ads include photos of individuals and families with phrases such as “In Michigan, all are welcome: Discover the benefits of living in a state that protects your rights,” and “In Michigan all are welcome: Enjoy your right to reproductive freedom.”
The latter ad features a photo of three young women who appear to be walking on a college campus.
The Michigan Economic Development Corporation, in posting one of the ads to Facebook, wrote, “Michigan is proud to protect your fundamental human freedoms. We’re a state that’s on the right side of history.”
Whitmer touted the ad campaign in a social media post Tuesday, repeating a line from her State of the State address earlier this year, when she said, “bigotry is bad for business.”
The Democratic governor has called on residents and businesses in other states to move to Michigan because of the state’s new constitutional amendment guaranteeing women a right to an abortion and an expansion of the state’s civil rights law adding sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of protected classes, such as race and ethnicity.
“I wasn’t kidding when I said bigotry is bad for business,” Whitmer wrote Tuesday. “If you live in a state trying to restrict your rights and freedoms, move to Michigan.”
Senate Republicans criticized the effort and said Whitmer’s policies, in general, would damage Michigan, comparing the state’s trajectory in the early 2000s under then-Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm, when the state lost more than 800,000 jobs.
“It doesn’t surprise me that Republican-led states continue to grow while our population continues to decline under the Democratic trifecta,” said Jeff Wiggins, a spokesman for Senate Republican Leader Aric Nesbitt of Lawton, referring to the opposing party’s control of the state House, Senate and governor’s office.
Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and Texas were among the states with the fastest-growing population between July 2021 and July 2022, according to an analysis by Pew Charitable Trusts. All of the states targeted by Michigan’s ad campaign gained population between July 2021 and July 2022. Michigan was one of 18 states to lose population within the same time frame.
More:Michigan faces population crossroads after decades of slow growth, aging
More:Whitmer creates commission to study solutions to Michigan population loss
More:As Michigan ages, census data suggests rural counties will show most strain
More:New anti-discrimination laws fuel funding surge for Michigan agency
The ad’s placement in the Florida market comes amid a war of the peninsulas, as the red and blue states compete on political, economic and population fronts.
Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars from Michigan residents in the past, most notably during the pandemic when he visited northern Michigan amid a Florida COVID-19 surge. He is also running for the GOP presidential nomination.
Florida’s chief financial officer in April 2021 sent Whitmer tourism pamphlets after a controversial trip she took to the southern state during the COVID-19 pandemic made national news. Her administration at the time had encouraged residents not to travel out of state during the pandemic.
Additionally, in March, a conservative think tank based in the Sunshine State sponsored a billboard in Lansing encouraging Michigan residents to move there in light of Michigan’s recent repeal of the right-to-work law, which outlawed union contracts requiring employees to pay labor unions a fee as a condition of employment.
“The free state of Florida protects your right to work,” the billboard from the nonprofit James Madison Institute said. “If you seek a pleasant peninsula, move to Florida.”
The invitation was a riff on Michigan’s motto: “If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look about you.”
Staff Writer Craig Mauger contributed.
.png#keepProtocol "The Key to Boosting Retention")
More Stories
Employee Appreciation Day: How to build a culture of year-round recognition
Data Never Sleeps Turns 11!
George Jenkins’ Alyssa Currie signs first bowling scholarship in school history