Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (left) Attorney General Dana Nessel (center) and Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson (right) | Getty Images and Andrew Roth photos
A Michigan Republican activist says the newly expanded House Oversight Committee should wreck the future political plans of Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and Attorney General Dana Nessel, all Democrats, by impeaching them in the GOP-controlled House and forcing trials in the Michigan Senate — although he concedes the effort would be unlikely to remove them from office.
“We might not have the 2/3 votes in the Senate required for removal and conviction, but we damn well can derail Whitmer’s 2028 Presidential campaign, Jocelyn Benson’s 2026 Gubernatorial campaign, and whatever the hell Nessel is up to as we try to at least get SOME justice for their victims!” wrote Brandon Hall in an email blast titled, “The 3 Witches F*cked Around — Now It’s Time They Find Out.”
Both former Michigan GOP Chair Ron Weiser and former Co-Chair Meshawn Maddock — who’s running for chair this month — have previously called the three female Democratic leaders “witches.”
Hall announces expanded House Oversight Committee centered on GOP concerns about state govt.
Hall tried to organize an impeachment effort against Whitmer in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic and was also involved in organizing a “Stop the Steal” rally during President Donald Trump’s 2020 effort to overturn the election results after losing to former President Joe Biden.
Hall was convicted in 2013 of election fraud for filing forged nominating signatures for a judicial candidate and was sentenced to 30 days in jail and 18 months probation.
He said new House Speaker Matt Hall (R-Richland Twp.), who is of no relation, “has already repeatedly proven that he means business unlike any Speaker we have ever seen,” and urged the new GOP majority to strike quickly against Whitmer, Benson and Nessel.
“This is a special opportunity we only have for a limited time — we didn’t take back the State House Majority just to circle jerk around,” said Brandon Hall, who notes that the Oversight Committee and its chair, state Rep. Jay Deboyer (Clay Twp.), have “been equipped with full subpoena power” and that if they were to discover “significant evidence in their historic investigation into Gretchen Whitmer, Jocelyn Benson, and/or Dana Nessel, it’s absolutely imperative we impeach them so they can stand trial in the Senate.”
Hall did not respond to a request for comment.
Rosie Jones, a spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks (D-Grand Rapids), dismissed the effort.
“The subject line of the email tells us everything we need to know about the character of the people pushing this,” she told the Advance.
Michigan Democratic Party Chair Lavora Barnes said while Brandon Hall and Matt Hall may be unrelated, the sentiments in the email are connected to actions by the new House GOP majority.
“Matt Hall’s political attacks in the state House have clearly been noticed by radicals who are calling for more baseless, politically motivated investigations into Governor Whitmer based on lies and conspiracy theories. These accusations are extreme and riddled with deeply dangerous language — like the kind that inspired the attempted kidnapping of Governor Whitmer a few years ago. Matt Hall and his House Republicans should be the first to come out and condemn this behavior — it’s dangerous, and Michiganders deserve better,” said Barnes.
A request for comment was also sent to the Michigan Republican Party as well as Whitmer’s office, but have yet to be returned.
Speaker Hall, whose office also has yet to respond to a request for comment from the Advance, announced the expanded committee’s power last month, saying they would provide what Republicans feel is long overdue supervision of several state departments and government spending.
“We’re hiring a number of lawyers and investigators, people with prosecution experience, people with investigative experience, because we’re not messing around. We are going to get to the bottom of the misspending of government funds, and also departments that are blatantly breaking the law,” said Hall, who previously served as chair of the Oversight Committee from 2019 through 2020.
At the time of that announcement, DeBoyer said that the newly provided subpoena power would not be used for partisan political purposes.
“When we do have to execute that subpoena power, if we do have to execute that subpoena power, it’s going to be done professionally. It’s going to be done respectfully. It certainly is not going to be used as a political weapon.” DeBoyer said.
Brandon Hall, however, believes the committee can prove misconduct in office based on actions taken by Whitmer during the pandemic to combat the spread of COVID-19.
This is not Hall’s first go-around trying to target Whitmer for her pandemic actions, having helped arrange an April 2020 rally in front of her Lansing home over the issue.
Hall didn’t say why Benson and Nessel should be impeached, but concluded the email with “The 3 Witches “f*cked around, now it’s time for them to ‘find out.’ Their victims deserve justice, Michiganders across the political spectrum demand it.”
Dennis Darnoi, a GOP strategist with Farmington Hills-based Densar Consulting LLC, said he thinks the effort is misguided and contrary to what House Republicans are hoping to accomplish.
“It just seems like an incredible waste of time and waste of focus to do something when even within what I read, it admits that you’re not going to accomplish the end goal because you’re not going to be able to move anything through the state Senate,” he told the Advance.
Darnoi noted a similar attempt in 2020 to impeach Whitmer over her pandemic orders “went absolutely nowhere,” and to try and repeat that would be “incredibly wasteful of the limited time that the Republicans have to make their case for 2026. I don’t see why it would be spent pursuing this course of action.”
Darnoi said there are more appropriate and more likely paths to defeat Democrats, namely at the ballot box.
“I mean, this is not serious, and if the voters really don’t like Whitmer, if they don’t like Benson, if they don’t like Nessel, they may have opportunities in the very near future to register that at the ballot box and that’s the appropriate place for it. This is just a sideshow that doesn’t deserve any serious Republican’s time,” he said.
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