Unions to make push for Bernero?

Nolan Finley of the Detroit News reports that the state’s major unions — the UAW, AFL-CIO and MEA — “have committed to an intense two-week push to get Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero over the top in the Aug. 3 gubernatorial primary.” He then provides some details of what he’s heard about that push:

Unions are getting a late start. But they reportedly are willing to spend more than $2 million raised from their membership and deep-pocket Democrats. That’s a mind boggling amount of money. Many of the candidates haven’t spent that much from start-to-finish, and some political consultants are skeptical that it’s even possible to buy that much air time at this point.

Led by new UAW President Bob King, the unions have taken over the Bernero campaign, purging his staff and bringing in Steve Rosenthal, a top gun strategist and former political director of the national AFL-CIO.

They reportedly will launch a flurry of ads reminding voters Dillon opposes abortion rights — pollsters say Bernero’s numbers soar when voters are told Dillon is pro-life — and will fund a massive get-out-the-vote drive, an area unions dominate.

If this push by the unions materializes, it could make change the Democratic primary completely. Neither candidate has great name recognition, but Bernero has even less than Andy Dillon — and the voters have little knowledge of the views of either of them. And while recent polls give Dillon a 20-point edge, they also show more than 50 percent of likely Democratic voters are still undecided.

Perhaps more importantly, as Finley points out, a poll last week showed that when voters are informed that Dillon is anti-choice on abortion, support for Bernero takes a huge jump — enough to overcome that 20-point lead and give the race to the Lansing mayor. The only thing that has prevented this from happening up until now is lack of funds.

If the unions are ready to put that kind of money into a last-minute ad blitz, Bernero can still win this primary.