Analysis
This article is based upon the response of gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos to comments made by Senator Carl Levin the day before. DeVos, Levin and Granholm campaign spokesperson Chris DeWitt are cited in this story. No new information is provided and there is no verification by the reporter of claims made by any of the sources cited, particularly of the number that DeVos gives for jobs lost in Michigan during Granholm’s time in office.
Article Text
Editor’s note: Republican gubernatorial candidate Dick DeVos met Tuesday with the Press editorial board. This story reflects that interview. Later in the week, Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm will meet with the editorial board, and the Press will publish another story.
Dick DeVos on Tuesday angrily responded to accusations by U.S. Sen. Carl Levin that Amway Corp. under DeVos’ leadership undermined federal efforts to tear down trade barriers with China.
“I don’t have a clue what he’s talking about and he doesn’t have a clue either,” said DeVos, Republican candidate for governor, during a meeting with Press editors and reporters. DeVos was president of Amway, now Alticor Inc., from 1992-2002. He called the comments from Levin, D-Detroit, “irresponsible, absolutely irresponsible.”
That was one of many sharp rebuttals DeVos offered during the hour-long interview, as his bid to unseat Democratic Gov. Jennifer Granholm enters the last frenetic month.
Granholm, he said, does not deserve to be re-elected.
“You’ve got to have a lot of guts to run for re-election when you haven’t performed,” he said.
In addition, he accused the governor of engaging in “the politics of personal destruction” with attacks on him.
Levin said Tuesday that Amway’s investment in China isn’t a success story, as DeVos has claimed, because the company agreed not to sell American-made products there.
“To say his company will not sell American-made goods in China, to call that a success story — it may be a victory for the company because they’re making more money. But it’s a loss, it’s a defeat for Michigan.”
And Levin said DeVos’ claim of success hurts efforts to lower trade barriers with China.
“When we go to try to force down these barriers in China, China says, ‘Oh, wait a minute. You’ve got a guy who opened business here in China. He says that’s a success.’ That undermines our efforts.”
Amway invested in China, a booming market, and built factories and retail outlets there because the Chinese government required it, DeVos has said. He said during his interview with The Press that he didn’t understand Levin’s complaint.
Also Tuesday, DeVos decried the tone of the governor’s campaign, saying she has indulged in the “sort of politics people in Michigan rightly object to.”
Ads that criticize DeVos for investing in China as president of Amway are an example of Granholm’s “cynical manipulation,” he said.
Granholm and Democrats are “playing on fear, possibly playing on an undercurrent of racism,” DeVos said.
Granholm spokesman Chris DeWitt said race isn’t an issue. “If Dick DeVos were creating jobs in London, we’d be using images of Big Ben,” DeWitt said.
DeWitt said there’s nothing to the notion that Granholm is running a cynical campaign. “He has a record. He’s running on that record and we’re discussing that record,” DeWitt said.
DeVos said Granholm has lost 85,000 jobs on her watch, and overseen high levels of personal bankruptcy, foreclosures as well as plummeting real estate values. His election as a businessman would send a powerful message to prospective businesses, especially in a “labor-dominated” state, he said.
“That’s the world I live in, the world I understand. That’s the language I speak,” DeVos said.
The future of the state’s economy has to be more than just automobile manufacturing, DeVos added.
“The real driver for our future growth is right under our nose,” DeVos said, saying it involves expanding existing small- and medium-sized businesses.
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