On the eve of our primary, it is important for everyone to realize that our city is in a time of great transition. A new mayor will be chosen by our city and a city council election will provide new leaders that will have the obligation to fight for your needs. While I feel that my qualifications speak for themselves, I wanted to take a moment and speak about the positives of the other members running and connect with the people of the city of Lansing to get a crucial message across: We need to unify.
When I first sat down to write this piece today, my initial reaction was to discuss the issues. I have read recently that I am against medical marijuana and this statement is false. To be clear, I am for any issue that will produce jobs and help the city of Lansing. While I could sit here and be defensive, I feel the bigger issue that needs to be explored today is that all of the candidates bring something unique to the table. What I have read recently is a smear campaign that has led to more mudslinging than fact-slinging and while I have not been the target, this needs to stop. I come here today to stand up for my opponents because my message of everyone deserving a seat at the table is a message of fairness.
During the 2016 Presidential Election, I worked on the Hillary Clinton Campaign. While I believe in my heart that Donald Trump was the wrong choice for our country, we as Democrats stepped away from the message and got into a war-of-words which is the one thing that could’ve cost us an election and sadly, it did. Hillary Clinton should have been our leader but we stepped away from the issues and I do not want this to occur in this election. I am firm believer that as a whole, the people of Lansing are an intelligent group that have strived to make our town a unique capital city and division amongst us is not going to help a turnaround of our economy. We want Lansing to not just be the capital of Michigan but a capital city where jobs are flowing and people are not apt to leave our city but to regenerate it. A dirty election is not something that we should endorse and quite frankly, we are better than this. While I am proud of my position in life and what I have accomplished to get to this point, I do not want to win because of my opponents’ colorful past, I want us to focus on how we can change our town for the better. I am publicly asking all newspapers and websites to stop posting dirt on the candidates and to focus on our platforms. Together, we can turn the lights on in Lansing, divided, we will face a similar situation to what occurred in November. We all better than that.
Thank you for your time. Yanice Y. Jackson