Chedrick Greene is a Marine veteran and a fire captain. He has spent his life running toward problems other people run from. On Tuesday night in Saginaw, Michigan, he did it again, and the margin was not even close.
Greene won the special election for Michigan’s 35th State Senate District by 19 points, defeating Republican lawyer Jason Tunney in a district that former Vice President Kamala Harris carried by less than one percentage point in the 2024 presidential election.
The result sent a message: in one of the most hotly contested swing states in the country, Democrats are not just holding ground heading into the midterms, they are gaining it.
The win keeps Democrats in control of the Michigan State Senate, a chamber that has become a critical battleground in a state home to competitive Senate and governor’s races later this year. And it adds another data point to what is becoming one of the more significant political trends of 2026: Democrats consistently outperforming their 2024 margins in special elections across the country.
“We delivered this decisive victory by listening and speaking to the things keeping everyday people up at night, worries about affordability, safety, and freedom,” Greene said in his victory speech.
Greene’s biography is the kind that campaigns are built around. He is a Marine veteran and a fire captain, a man whose entire professional identity is built around public service and showing up when things go wrong. He ran on that record directly, promising to lower the cost of living and fight for the working families who make up the backbone of the Saginaw area.
One of his campaign ads depicted him putting out a Dumpster fire tagged with the labels “higher rents,” “job loss,” and “price gouging.” It was on-brand in every sense, a visual that communicated exactly who he was and what he was running against without needing a word of explanation.
Greene was backed by Democratic Governor Gretchen Whitmer and by now-Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet, the former occupant of the seat who gave it up to enter Congress in January 2025.
The midterms are still months away. But Tuesday night in Saginaw, Michigan, a fire captain put out another fire.
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