Michigan Gov. Whitmer Appears with Trump Again

Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer of Michigan didn’t hide her face when she appeared Tuesday with President Trump in her state as he marked his 100th day in office and announced new jet fighters for a National Guard base there.

Their joint appearance stood in contrast to an awkward one when Whitmer found herself inside the Oval Office earlier this month while Trump signed a set of executive orders and held a question-and-answer session with reporters. She proceeded to try to hide herself—she was photographed holding blue folders in front of her face—and the fact that she was in such proximity to a Republican president many in her party try to avoid.

This time at the Selfridge Air National Guard Base, where the president announced that A-10 fighter planes would be replaced with new F-15 jet fighters, Trump gestured for her to come to the microphone and stand behind his presidential seal. “I hadn’t planned to speak,” Whitmer said. “But on behalf of all the military men and women who serve our country and serve so honorably on behalf of the state of Michigan, I am really damn happy we are here.”

During her White House visit earlier in the month, Whitmer had been trying to secure funding for an expansion of the base near Detroit and warn the president about the impact of his tariffs on her state’s auto industry.

“I’m so grateful this announcement was made today,” Whitmer, a potential 2028 presidential candidate, said of the expansion of the base’s assets, before shaking Trump’s hand.

Trump said Whitmer had “done a very good job” and noted that she had visited him at the White House to lobby for the base. “She was very effective,” he added.

The Michigan governor has shown a greater willingness to try to work with Trump than some other Democratic governors.

Their meeting at the National Guard base was held before Trump appeared at a rally in Macomb County, a suburban battleground area north of Detroit in a swing state that Trump won in November.

Away from Trump, Whitmer has expressed concern about what his trade war will mean for her state’s large auto and manufacturing industries.

“Tariffs need to be used like a scalpel, not a hammer,” she said in a Washington speech before her recent visit to the White House. “There is a purpose to having tariffs, but the uncertainty that has now been created, the anxiety and the fear, just breeds destruction.”

An early field of Democrats believed to be jockeying for the party’s presidential nomination in 2028 are trying to calibrate their approach to Trump. Some, including California Gov. Gavin Newsom, have conceded Trump’s views on certain issues are more in line with the mood of the country, while broadly denouncing his policies. Others, like Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, have been more combative in their tone.

After her surprise appearance in the Oval Office, Whitmer thanked Trump for his work on the National Guard base and other issues, but also sought to distance herself from the president.

“The governor was surprised that she was brought into the Oval Office during President Trump’s press conference without any notice of the subject matter,” a spokesperson for the governor said at the time. “Her presence is not an endorsement of the actions taken or statements made at that event.”