Terry Bowman, one of the leaders of Michigan’s right-to-work movement, is kicking off his Republican campaign for Democrat John Dingell's congressional seat.
Bowman is a conservative UAW worker who wants to represent a district that went overwhelmingly for President Barack Obama in 2012 and was represented in Congress by an outspoken supporter of unions since 1955, Marisa Schultz writes in The Detroit News.
Dingell, 87, said last he week is plans to retire, and his wife, Debbie, has announced she is running to succeed him. The 12th Congressional District includes the Ann Arbor area, Downriver Detroit and Dearborn.
Bowman, 48, and founder of the Union Conservatives, is positioning himself as the anti-Dingell. Bowman said he will run against the Affordable Care Act, the federal health care law that Rep. Dingell helped write and defends.
Bowman acknowledges he has an uphill battle in a district that is heavily Democratic and President Barack Obama won by 34 percentage points in 2012. But the Ford Motor Co. worker said he believes he can appeal to the blue-collar roots in the district by running a door-to-door nontraditional campaign between his shifts at the Rawsonville plant.
