Jack Bergman

U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman faces two Republican challengers in the August primary despite his incumbency and a Trump endorsement.

The congressman is dealing with an ethics complaint and intraparty disputes over a state Senate endorsement.

Challengers Justin Michal and Matthew DenOtter argue Bergman is not present enough and has not delivered on promises.

U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman has represented the Upper Peninsula and Up North Michigan for most of a decade, faced few serious challenges, voted faithfully for his party and ably defined the rightward swing of the once Democratic-leaning 1st Congressional District to the place it now occupies in the pro-Republican, pro-Trump political firmament.

So, why are some in his party out to sack him?

Bergman, of Watersmeet, is running for a sixth two-year term this year and has considerable advantages, one being the inestimable value of being the incumbent in the second largest (by land mass) U.S. House district east of the Mississippi with no large media markets for challengers to tap directly into to make up the name ID gap. He also has a well-funded campaign and President Trump’s endorsement.

But he also has two Republicans – Army veteran Justin Michal and healthcare executive Matthew DenOtter – running against him in the Aug. 4 primary. He's got an intraparty flap over his endorsement in a state Senate race he was expected to stay out of to contend with. Then there’s the ethics complaint filed by a couple of constituents over the Detroit News’ reporting that Bergman’s taxpayer-paid chief of staff, Tony Lis, seems to be skirting the spirit if not the letter of rules for disclosing outside income while running a political consulting operation on the side.

“I’m just so fed up,” said retired Antrim County Probate Judge Norman Hayes, one of the two men who filed the complaint to the House Ethics Committee, a former supporter of Bergman’s and, now, a political independent. “I’ve been a Republican my whole life.”

Even the chairman of the 1st District Republican Party, former state Rep. Daire Rendon of Lake City, told the Free Press this spring that some local party officials felt Bergman wasn’t as available across the district as they’d like, acknowledging that’s a tall order given its size. “We’re not just Traverse City, we’re not just Petoskey, we’re not just Marquette,” she said. “People are feeling like they’re a little bit left out.”

“My job as district chair is to support Republicans,” she said. “It’s not to pick winners and losers. We have primaries for that.”

Bergman expects to win despite headwinds and run in '28

But Bergman, a retired Marine lieutenant general and transplant to the U.P. who came seemingly out of nowhere to win an open seat in 2016, isn’t ceding any ground, saying after he wins another two-year term this year, he expects to run for a seventh, when he will be 81 years old, in 2028. His district spans 36 counties and nearly half Michigan’s landmass, he says. It’s tough to please everyone, but he or his staff make every event they can.

As for his endorsement of former state Rep. Beau LaFave for a state Senate seat early this year, which caused a few Republican legislators backing state Rep. Dave Prestin for the same seat to say it was another example of the congressman's disrespect toward local Republicans and pull their endorsements of Bergman, he called his own nod to LaFave “routine,” their reaction an “indictment on what the insatiable desire to hold on to power leads people to do.”

"He (Bergman) has a number of times labored to find primary opponents for sitting members ... It's been frustrating," said state Sen. Ed McBroom, R-Waucedah, who is term-limited and endorsed Prestin to replace him. But he said Bergman's endorsement for LaFave led to Bergman's supporters going on social media and elsewhere to verbally attack Prestin's team, including him. "That is why we did what we did... They started this war, we didn't," he said.

Then, there's Bergman's own race. In April, Bergman told the Free Press he welcomed challengers, that competition “is part of what makes our system strong." But on May 20, in a post on Facebook, he accused “anti-Trump forces within the Republican Party” of making a “desperately (sic) grasp for perceived power,” saying candidates who reject Trump’s endorsements “should step aside… or face defeat.” One local outlet described it as an “ultimatum” to his rivals.

“The voters of Michigan’s 1st Congressional District are intelligent, independent-minded people,” Michal told the Free Press, responding to Bergman’s Facebook post. “They are fully capable of deciding who best represents their values and interests without being told who should ‘step aside.’”

"He appears," DenOtter said of Bergman, "to believe voters will overlook what I view as a troubling voting record ... simply because he is standing next to someone (Trump) in a photograph."

Attempts to unseat Bergman face long odds

Let's be clear: Any effort to knock off Bergman is a long shot. No, his campaign didn't respond to the Free Press' request for comment on the ethics matter and it's generating headlines. But it's unclear whether it, his endorsement of LaFave and the falling out with U.P. legislators (including McBroom as well as state Reps. Greg Markkanen and Karl Bohnak) or complaints that he doesn't hold town halls or make as many public appearances as some constituents might want − or longstanding claims that he doesn't really reside in the district, which he and people who know him well dismiss as made up − will make any difference.

If Bergman were to lose either in the primary or the Nov. 3 general election, it would be a bombshell. Trump's endorsement almost certainly immunizes him in the primary; it's been 18 years since a Democrat (then-U.S. Rep. Bart Stupak, of Menominee) won election in the 1st. As of the end of March and the last campaign finance report, Bergman had raised $1.4 million compared to DenOtter's almost entirely self-funded $270,000 and Michal's $40,000. (The Democrats aren't much better off: Callie Barr has raised $360,000 and was the nominee two years ago; Bergman beat her by more than 100,000 votes or 11 percentage points that year. The other two, Kyle Blomquist and Wayne Stiles, had less than $85,000 in their campaign accounts each as of March 31.)

In fact, DenOtter's late entry into the race this winter after the flap over Bergman's state Senate endorsement probably only helps the incumbent by further splitting the primary vote.

It's not gone unnoticed that DenOtter previously ran for a congressional district in southeastern Michigan with Bergman's support and employed those same staffers who are now the subject of the ethics complaint. In fact, his most recent campaign finance report shows he still owes Lis' firm, Right Way to Win, some $97,000 for work done in that 2022 race. (DenOtter called suggestions he entered the race to help Bergman "laughable," saying the race is "about something bigger than past associations, it’s about representation and results today.") In any event, it was and is tough to see Bergman as substantially at risk, though Michal, of Grayling, has been continually traversing the district, banging the drum for change.

"I've been to counties where we've had sitting sheriffs for 30 years say they've never met the congressman," said Michal, a 43-year-old Iraq War veteran who has been running on a conservative platform of holding issue forums in every county in the district if elected and making good on Republican promises to cut spending, balance the budget, end wars, reduce inflation and improve housing and jobs. Bergman and others, he says, haven't followed through on the Trump agenda.

Rendon, for one, acknowledged that Michal is a homegrown 1st District candidate working his way across the district.

"People are tired of the stories. They need resolve," Michal said. "They (Republicans in Congress) passed 5% of Trump's legislative agenda then went on vacation... It’s the same pick-you-up talking points we’ve heard the last 20 years that aren’t helping the voters at all... People want a younger face and they're not getting that from Jack Bergman and nobody knows who DenOtter is."

As for DenOtter, who now lives in Boyne City, he said while he respects Bergman's service he believes the district "needs a more active, present and engaged approach," and someone who is "pushing aggressively for results." He's touting himself as a more committed conservative.

He also says his experience in the healthcare field − his LinkedIn page lists mostly executive positions in medical and pharmaceutical sales − makes him a natural for understanding "the real challenges facing patients and providers in rural communities." His campaign website hammers at the need for better Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements in a congressional district with the highest median age and greatest percentage of citizens not in the labor force in Michigan.

In face of Michal, DenOtter challenge, Bergman makes pitch

Bergman's pitch for reelection is pretty straightforward: DenOtter, despite Bergman's previous endorsement of him, he says, is a "flawed candidate" who has worked for Big Pharma and coincidentally entered the race at a time Bergman was pushing legislation to keep rural hospitals from potentially paying more upfront for pharmaceuticals.

As for Michal, he's floating "the exact same made-up narrative that my last primary opponent used and we beat him 80-20 in 2024," Bergman said. (He beat Josh Saul by 79%-21%, so he's almost spot-on.) Meanwhile, he said he's delivered on tax cuts, pushed for aid for farmers and veterans and is working on expanded dental care, broadband access, and mobile career and technical education programs.

"We’ve followed through on our commitments and delivered real, tangible results," Bergman said. "At the end of the day, my focus remains the same − showing up, listening and representing everyone across this district, no matter where they came from or how long they’ve called it home."

It's hard to question his support for Trump: His score in doing so in Congress is sterling. Even his detractors have a difficult time finding fault with his voting record. He pushed for additional emergency funding for northern Michigan after devastating ice storms and helped get it. He's repeatedly called for protecting rural mail delivery. And in recent months, Bergman's been more visible: attending a Lincoln Day dinner in Escanaba, getting his picture taken (with LaFave) at Pine Mountain.

Over the years, Bergman has generated a lot of mystery, from questions about where he spent his off-hours (Louisiana, where he formerly lived, is often mentioned) to how a newcomer, albeit one with an impressive military bio (a helicopter pilot in Vietnam, his bio states he's the highest-ranking combat veteran to ever serve in the U.S. House), managed to split his first primary, in 2016, with two well-known former state senators, Jason Allen and the late Tom Casperson on the ballot.

But he clearly has his supporters. Doreen Takalo, the 80-year-old vice chairwoman of the Marquette County Republicans who has been working for the party for decades, is among them. She says she's been to his house, and he's always responsive when she or the party needs him.

"I was a Casperson girl and when he lost, (then-U.S. Rep. Dan Benishek) called me up and said you have to help Jack Bergman. I said 'no way'… He said 'get your ass over there and give one for the team.' I did and I never looked back," she said. They met for lunch and her support hasn't wavered since.

"When we have an event, he's here," she said. "I don’t understand why anybody would want to run against him... A lot of people like to play with politics. They think they know it all. They don't know it all."

Contact Todd Spangler: [email protected]. Follow him on X @tsspangler.

This story has been updated with additional context.