DETROIT (Michigan News Source) – The Detroit News conducted an investigation into John Roth, the Republican candidate to be the Michigan House Representative for the 104th District and published the article on
Tuesday. The newspaper reports that Roth has run “afoul” of the state law’s residency requirements.

Because of redistricting, Michigan Rep. John Roth would have had to run against state Rep. Jack O’Malley in this year’s primary. Instead, Roth chose to move a few miles away in order to run in the nearby newly created 104th district where he will represent residents of several counties including Grand Traverse (Traverse City), Kalkaska and Antrim.

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Election law requires that a candidate for the House is a “registered and qualified elector of the district he or she represents by the filing deadline” and it states that the candidate has to be a resident of the municipality for 30 days.

The deadline to become a candidate for the Michigan House was April 19 but The Detroit News reports that township records show that Roth registered as a voter in Green Lake Township near Interlochen (104th District) on May 23rd, which was two months after he filed his March 10th affidavit of identity to run in the district.

Election officials didn’t catch the discrepancy at the time and he was allowed to run in the primary and won.
The Detroit News admitted that it’s unknown how this issue will proceed “short of judicial intervention” and retired state elections director, Chris Thomas, said he didn’t know of an administrative mechanism to remove Roth from the ballot.

Roth told The Detroit News that his delayed change in his voter registration is the state’s fault and that he has nothing to hide. He argues that he attempted to change his driver’s license online on March 19th which would mean his voter registration would have also changed automatically. However, when Roth went to Green Lake Township,
he found out that he wasn’t registered to vote.

The Secretary of State was contacted by the Detroit News and they said they don’t have any record of Roth trying to change his driver’s license address in 2022. However, his license address was changed automatically when the voter registration was changed in May.

Roth’s Democratic opponent in the race, Cathy Albro, says that “every candidate who’s running for political office should follow the law and the rules.”

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Mark Brewer, former Democratic Party chairman is calling for Roth’s removal from the ballot. He said, “He’s ineligible to be a candidate for the state House because he wasn’t a registered voter in the district before filing deadline.”

Roth is currently representing the 104th District and is on the Energy, Health Policy, Transportation and Commerce & Tourism Committees. He beat his Republican opponent, Katie Kniss, in the primary with 51.99% of the vote.
Roth appeared on Traverse City’s Ron Jolly Show on WTCM-AM on Thursday, August 25th to discuss the matter. He said, “I’m not concerned at all about this story because it’s all political games and it’s just not anything that I’m concerned with.”

When asked if he’d heard of any plans to take the matter to a court, Roth said, “I have not heard anything…and it’s out of my control so I really don’t care. It doesn’t change anything, what I’m doing today. I’m still out knocking doors. I’m still going to every meeting possible. I’m going out to talk to the voters…”

Roth said voters want to know how politicians are going to serve them and he intends to stay on message.