Race to succeed Kildee draws a crowd as expected

It's official: The race to succeed U.S. Rep. Dan Kildee, D-Flint Township, has drawn a crowd.

With the deadline for filing nominating petitions with the state passing on Tuesday, the official field to replace Kildee after six two-year terms in office drew four candidates each in both the Democratic and Republican primaries to be held on Aug. 6.

That doesn't come as much of a surprise, either. While a Democrat named Kildee − either Dan or his late uncle Dale, who preceded him before stepping down following the 2012 election − has represented the congressional district centered on Flint and Saginaw Bay since 1977, the region has been trending more Republican in recent elections and is widely considered a tossup this year.

As presently constituted, the fields look to be some pretty strong ones, too, suggesting that as far as U.S. House races go, this one could garner a lot of attention − and spending − from outside Michigan as well as in.

The Democratic field for what is Michigan's 8th Congressional District (and also includes Midland, as well as Saginaw and Bay City) includes state Sen. Kristen McDonald Rivet, D-Bay City, as well as Flint Mayor Sheldon Neeley, state Board of Education President Pamela Pugh of Saginaw and Matt Collier, a former Flint mayor and district director for Dale Kildee who also worked for the Department of Veterans Affairs under former President Barack Obama.

The Republican field, meanwhile, includes Paul Junge of Grand Blanc, who lost to Kildee in 2022 as well as Mary Draves, a Midland native and businesswoman who spent decades at Dow Chemical, rising to a vice president's position. Another state Board of Education member, Nikki Snyder, who lives outside the district in Dexter, filed to run as a Republican after abandoning a U.S. Senate run and the GOP field is rounded out by Anthony Hudson, a small trucking company owner in Grand Blanc.

Contact Todd Spangler: tspangler@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter@tsspangler.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Race to succeed Kildee draws a crowd as expected