Congressional District 6 - Redistricted (MI-06)

Incumbent - Fred Upton (R-St Joseph)
Years in office as of 2012 election - 26.
The old 6th District information is here

Challengers - Mike O'Brien (D-Douglas)

Update 8-30-2012 - Fred Upton won his primary in an easier than expected win. 

UPDATE 5-1-2012 -  Jack Hoogendyk has filed a primary challenge to Fred Upton in a rematch of 2010. Upton won the primary last time, but it was not by as large of margin as one would expect. 

This is a largely unchanged district. It drops two townships in Calhoun County to Justin Amash, and gains most of the rest of Allegan County outside the City of Holland (mostly in Ottawa County), which happens to be the most Republican portion of the county, and possibly the most Republican area of the state. Some of those areas are 80%+ GOP most years. That significantly helps Upton, who is in a very difficult district on paper. Upton himself wins easily. His replacement will have a much tougher time.

Kalamazoo County is democrat leaning, although most of the suburbs are competitive, and some of them are republican. Jack Hoogendyk won a difficult district three times, and that stayed GOP when he left. Jace Bolger's district is less difficult but not easy on paper, and that's been GOP for a long time. Tom George and Tonya Schuitmaker won a very difficult countywide state senate district that leans democrat on paper. There is a different in presidential years and non-presidential years in Kalamazoo County with the WMU voters. Van Buren and Cass Counties are almost always close. Berrien and St Joseph Counties are usually republican leaning, although not in 2008. Berrien County does have a democrat stronghold in Benton Harbor/Benton Township with Niles also leaning democrat. The burbs usually outvote the cities.

The old district had a 20000 vote spread for Bush and 32000 vote spread for Obama. The new district solely thanks to the Allegan County help had about a 27000 vote spread for Bush and 28000 vote spread for Obama. It's still a difficult district, but there's less chance to get caught offguard. Upton's weakest percentage overall in the last district is about 58% in 2008. Here's the numbers. I'm using Upton's 08 numbers because it's the same opponent in 2010 (Don Cooney) and shows more individual strength.

2008
	McCain	Obama	Total	Diff	GOP	DEM	Diff
Allegan County	30061	24165	54226	5896	55.44%	44.56%	10.87%
Holland City	-2093	-1391	-3484	-702	60.07%	39.93%	20.15%
Berrien County	36130	40381	76511	-4251	47.22%	52.78%	-5.56%
Cass County	11114	12083	23197	-969	47.91%	52.09%	-4.18%
Kalamazoo County	51554	77051	128605	-25497	40.09%	59.91%	-19.83%
St Joseph County	12886	12322	25208	564	51.12%	48.88%	2.24%
Van Buren County	15534	18588	34122	-3054	45.52%	54.48%	-8.95%
			0	0	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!
Total	155186	183199	338385	-28013	45.86%	54.14%	-8.28%
2004
	Bush	Kerry	Total	Diff	GOP	DEM	Diff
Allegan County	34022	19355	53377	14667	63.74%	36.26%	27.48%
Holland City	-2479	-941	-3420	-1538	72.49%	27.51%	44.97%
Berrien County	41076	32846	73922	8230	55.57%	44.43%	11.13%
Cass County	12964	9537	22501	3427	57.62%	42.38%	15.23%
Kalamazoo County	57147	61462	118609	-4315	48.18%	51.82%	-3.64%
St Joseph County	15340	9648	24988	5692	61.39%	38.61%	22.78%
Van Buren County	17634	16151	33785	1483	52.19%	47.81%	4.39%
			0	0	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!
Total	175704	148058	323762	27646	54.27%	45.73%	8.54%
2008
	Upton	Cooney	Total	Diff	GOP	DEM	Diff
Allegan County	19733	10777	30510	8956	64.68%	35.32%	29.35%
Holland City	0	0	0	0	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!
Berrien County	46007	28530	74537	17477	61.72%	38.28%	23.45%
Cass County	14234	8148	22382	6086	63.60%	36.40%	27.19%
Kalamazoo County	68028	55599	123627	12429	55.03%	44.97%	10.05%
St Joseph County	17676	6925	24601	10751	71.85%	28.15%	43.70%
Van Buren County	20628	12461	33089	8167	62.34%	37.66%	24.68%
			0	0	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!	#DIV/0!
Total	186306	122440	308746	63866	60.34%	39.66%	20.69%