Voters get ready to cast their ballot

By Charles Sercombe
Election day is right around the corner.
Next Tuesday, Aug. 4, to be exact.
Early voting started this past weekend, with the city clerk’s office open on Saturdays and Sundays for voters to cast their ballots. And absentee ballots have already been mailed out, a few weeks ago, to those who applied for them.
At this point, if you have not yet returned your absentee ballot, it’s advised you hand-deliver it to the clerk’s office at city hall, or place it in a drop box located directly across from city hall that can be accessed 24 hours a day.
For Hamtramck voters, there are a slew of candidates for state and federal offices squaring off to be the ones included in the November General Election.
Locally, there is a proposal by the Hamtramck Recreation Department to renew a 10-year property tax in order to continue its programs.
The tax renewal has met with challenges in the past after voters initially rejected it. But the proposal eventually did manage to prevail in a later election.
There has been an uptick in local anti-taxers in the past year, and a number of residents have complained about their monthly water bills.
In other words, the fate of the tax renewal is up in the air. Hamtramck Public School teachers spent the weekend going door-to-door to gain support for the tax.
One development from this week was that the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) insisted on meeting with the city clerk and city officials regarding the city’s elections.
It was initially thought the DOJ wanted the city’s voter rolls, but according to a source, federal attorneys want to send in monitors for the primary election.
Hamtramck is no stranger to having federal monitors observe elections. For several years, monitors were here because of past voter discrimination accusations.
Hamtramck elections have also come under scrutiny in recent years over allegations of voter fraud.
Candidates and their supporters have been suspected of forging signatures on ballots as well as stuffing the city’s drop box with ballots that they illegally harvested from voters.
So far, only City Councilmembers Mohammed Hassan and Muhtasin Sadman have been convicted of election fraud-related misdemeanors after successfully beating felony charges of those election violations.
Polls are open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. on election day, Aug. 4.
Posted July 31, 2026