Detroit News: “McMorrow: What The Detroit Auto Show Teaches Us About Building The Future”

MICHIGAN — This week, Michigan Senate Majority Whip and candidate for U.S. Senate Mallory McMorrow penned an op-ed in the Detroit News outlining her vision for growing Michigan’s economy: fighting for Michigan manufacturing while also securing new opportunities in emerging industries, and championing policies that keep our workforce and our kids here in the state.

“And as a former industrial designer turned legislator running to represent Michigan in the U.S. Senate, I believe we need to harness both our history of manufacturing and our innovation to build a better future,” wrote McMorrow.

“Here's what makes the auto show so captivating, and such a point of pride for our state,” McMorrow continued. “It's not just the cars. It's the innovation. It's the spirit that says we're not just celebrating what we've built, but imagining the future. [...] That's our superpower. It's not just manufacturing. It's what happens when manufacturing meets innovation and imagination.”

Read the full op-ed here and below:

McMorrow: What the Detroit Auto Show teaches us about building the future

One day, the Lions will go all the way. But for now, the Detroit Auto Show is our Super Bowl.

Since 1907, when they first started showing cars at a beer garden near the Belle Isle bridge, the Detroit Auto Show has created the spark to allow us to dream. 

It cemented and celebrated Michigan as the epicenter of the American automotive industry and the undefeated home of next-generation automotive excellence. Each year is a postcard of that moment in time ― the American Dream embodied in each new model, new technology beyond what was possible before, designs to fit families’ evolving needs and lifestyles. If you wanted to know how Michiganders and Americans were feeling, experiencing and what they were dreaming of, you need look no further than the Detroit Auto Show to see it all brought to life. 

Here's what makes the auto show so captivating, and such a point of pride for our state: it's not just the cars. It's the innovation. It's the spirit that says we're not just celebrating what we've built, but imagining the future. Michigan didn’t just build the automobile; we manufactured it on an assembly line, which changed the world forever. 

We imagined safer conditions for auto workers. Michiganders in labor fought like hell to make it reality, and we built the middle class. That's our superpower. It's not just manufacturing. It's what happens when manufacturing meets innovation and imagination.

I grew up dreaming about cars. When I was in college and studying to be a car designer, I entered a national car design competition, and unbelievably, I won. I worked with expert craftsmen and modelers to hand-carve my design, full-scale, live on stage at the LA Auto Show.

And as a former industrial designer turned legislator running to represent Michigan in the U.S. Senate, I believe we need to harness both our history of manufacturing and our innovation to build a better future.

Yes, President Donald Trump’s sloppy tariffs are squeezing our suppliers, automakers and workers. Yes, his crusade against electric vehicles has kneecapped real investment and thousands of good-paying jobs we were so close to securing, ceding opportunity to China for vehicles that should be built here. 

All of that is a gut punch to our state, and I’m running to stop it. But stopping the damage isn't enough. To truly build a stronger Michigan, we need to do things differently. We need to imagine a future beyond what politics as usual has delivered. Then we have to go out and build it. We need to look around corners to growing industries that build on our automotive legacy, like aerospace, medical tech, chips and energy. 

We need to partner with labor and invest in apprenticeships that ready our workforce for those jobs ― the ones growing right now and the jobs of the future that don’t even exist yet. We need to do more than just fight like hell for every manufacturing job, we also have to look at what keeps these companies here. It's the same things that keep our kids here, like good schools, livable communities, strong infrastructure and affordable housing.

We need to retain and attract the next generation of Michiganders, and the only way to do that is to see the full picture of what they will need. Last month we passed my bipartisan, 10-year economic development legislation that creates a strategic plan for how Michigan can do exactly that, tailored to different communities across the state. 

Together with Republican Sen. John Damoose of Harbor Springs, we got it passed out of the Senate. In a nutshell, the idea behind the legislation is to approach economic development in Michigan the same way hundreds of car designers did for the models you’ve seen on the floor of Huntington Place this week. 

It’s listening first, coming up with many different solutions to a problem, ruthlessly testing and getting feedback from the people impacted, and working together to deliver something to be proud of.

Something that will make people’s lives better.

Sen. Mallory McMorrow, D-Royal Oak, represents Michigan’s 8th District.

###