LANSING — Michigan has been holding elections for attorney general for more than 170 years, but Nov. 3 will mark the first time voters will choose between two sitting county prosecuting attorneys.
Eaton County Prosecutor Doug Lloyd, the Republican, paints the contest as one between a career prosecutor backed by law enforcement, and a liberal political activist.
Washtenaw County Prosecutor Eli Savit, the Democrat, says the question is who will best protect the rights of Michiganders and stand up to powerful interests.
The last time Michigan elected a sitting county prosecutor as its top law enforcement officer was 1934, when Wayne County Prosecutor Harry Toy, a Republican, defeated Patrick O'Brien, the incumbent Democrat, records show. Many AGs
before and since Toy have had stints as county prosecutor on their resumes, but a Detroit Free Press search of historical records found that 2026 is the first time two sitting prosecutors have faced off for AG.
Andrea Bitely, a Lansing-based political and communications consultant who worked for former Republican Attorney General Bill Schuette, said serving as a county prosecuting attorney is an excellent training ground for AG.
"You learn a lot as a county prosecutor that you're not going to learn anywhere else," Bitely said.
"You're running an office. You're a CEO. You're managing a budget, keeping up with what is going on in Lansing and Washington, and you also have to run for re-election."
Chris De Witt, a Lansing-area political and communications consultant who worked for former Democratic AGs Jennifer Granholm and Frank Kelley, said county prosecutors are primarily crime fighters and the public perception is that state AGs have a similar role.
But in reality, most of the AG's work involves representing state agencies in civil litigation, De Witt said. "The state might be better off having someone with a great deal of experience in civil law," he said.
Both Lloyd, 60, and Savit, 43, have some of that. Lloyd, Eaton's prosecutor since 2013, was in private practice that included civil law from 1992 to 1995, according to his resume. Savit, Washtenaw prosecutor since 2021, worked briefly for the Jones Day law firm and then for the City of Detroit as senior legal counsel from 2016 to 2020, handling civil cases in both jobs.
Why they say they want the job
Lloyd: " I've watched for the last eight years and I've watched an office that I believe was the premier public service agency to work for, and it has become very partisan ... And that's not its responsibility. Its responsibility is to represent all 10 million people. I'm not a good complainer, but I know how to fix things. I decided to enter this race because I believe that we should get that office back to representing everyone, and not just a political side."
Savit: "I had read every page of Project 2025 before the election. And what I saw in Project 2025 was a legal blueprint for dismantling everything that I care about in American democracy: civil rights and voting rights, and environmental and consumer protection. Reproductive rights. And I knew that lawyers, because it was a legal blueprint, were going to be playing a really big role in standing up and preserving what we have in this country."
What each would change
Lloyd said in a July 24 interview he wants to restore the AG's Office to the status it had 35 years ago, under longtime Attorney General Frank Kelley, a Democrat. He said he will review the civil cases the office is now pursuing and determine whether each is benefiting Michigan residents or was filed for partisan reasons and should be discontinued.
Lloyd said he wants to realign the office to give more emphasis to fighting violent crime, illegal drugs, human trafficking and organized retail crime. He also said he wants to speed up the length of time it takes the Attorney General's Office to review criminal complaints.
Savit said that the misuse of artificial intelligence is the biggest emerging threat he sees to Michigan residents. During his first 100 days, he said he would issue comprehensive administrative rules, under the Consumer Protection Act, to address the misuse of AI. An example he gave was the use of AI for deceptive surveillance pricing — like marking up the price of medicine for a young mother who googled to find out how to reduce a fever for a crying child, he said.
Savit also said he would establish a team to support communities facing legal mismatches, such as when a huge corporation wants to force a data center on a small township.
Accomplishments
Asked which cases he is most proud of, Lloyd points to his work to get a bipartisan state law passed in 2022 that allows the Michigan Parole Board to consider certain prisoners for release only every five years, instead of annually or every other year.
Lloyd said he worked extensively with his state representatives, Democratic Rep. Angela Witwer of Delta Township and Sen. Sarah Anthony of Lansing, as well as Republican Rep. Sarah Lightner of Springport, who represented parts of Eaton County prior to the most recent redistricting, to get the legislation passed.
Lloyd said his motivation, in large part, was easing the pain of two survivors of Eaton County assaults in the 1970s by serial killer Don Miller.
Under the former system, victims had "about a six-month window where you can live your life," before getting a letter from the parole board about a pending hearing and getting "triggered again," Lloyd said.
For a second example, Lloyd points to a case prior to 2011, when he was the senior assistant prosecutor in charge of the Economic Crimes Unit, and he went after a contractor who had cheated a homeowner on a $25,000 roof replacement.
The man visited the ECU office in the Lansing Mall and told Lloyd he had paid the contractor the full amount, against the wishes of his wife. The man then came to the house, chained a ladder to a tree in the backyard, and never returned, Lloyd said. Police told the man it was a civil matter and they couldn't help him, he said.
Lloyd said his office went after the contractor, charged him with larceny by conversion, and got him to repay the homeowner. But every time the man's wife looked out the kitchen window, she saw the ladder chained to the tree and was reminded of what he'd done.
"I had the officers go out there and cut that chain off that ladder, and got that ladder removed ... so he no longer was getting yelled at," Lloyd said.
For his part, Savit points to the Economic Justice Unit he created in the Washtenaw prosecutor's office in 2021, which he said is the first of its kind in Michigan.
"Whether it's businesses stealing money from employees, scam artists targeting Washtenaw County residents, or labor trafficking, the Washtenaw County Prosecutor's Office stands ready to hold those who unlawfully impose economic harm accountable," the office website says.
In a Sept. 17 interview with the Free Press Editorial Board, Savit contrasted his Economic Justice Unit with the Economic Crimes Unit in Lloyd's office, which, according to statistics posted on the Eaton County website, has a strong emphasis on bad checks written to businesses, retail fraud, and crimes related to rental property.
"Economic crime — that's people stealing from businesses," Savit said. "I mean, we prosecute those. But I thought it was particularly important to have a specialized unit that focuses on the harm when businesses are screwing over workers or consumers." The special unit in Eaton County is "sort of the mirror opposite," he said.
Savit said he's also proud of his actions to limit the use of cash bail in Washtenaw County, though he said he sees that as a local decision that he would not try to promulgate statewide, if elected attorney general.
"The reason that I oppose cash bail is actually precisely because I am worried about wealthy, dangerous people being able to buy their way out," Savit said. "If you are defending that system, you're comfortable with the fact that Jeffrey Epstein, the first time he was arrested, was able to make bond. It didn't matter how high the bond was set — he was a billionaire."
Savit said his philosophy is simple. He doesn't want someone sitting in jail over a $500 bond for driving with a suspended license, and "I want dangerous people to be held, no matter how wealthy they are."
Savit noted that crime, including homicides and crimes involving gun violence, have fallen in Washtenaw County while his efforts to limit use of cash bail have been in place.
Controversies
Lloyd's biggest controversy might be his 2015 decision not to bring criminal charges against an Eaton County Sheriff's Office sergeant who fatally shot an unarmed 17-year-old motorist during a 2015 traffic stop.
Sgt. Jonathan Frost got into a roadside altercation with Deven Guilford and shot Guilford seven times after Guilford allegedly flashed his high beams at Frost's patrol vehicle and later refused to give Frost his driver's license, registration and proof of insurance, while recording the encounter on his cellphone.
Guilford's family sued and in 2017 settled the case for $2.4 million.
Frost initially used his stun gun on Guilford while the teen was lying on his stomach but would not put his hands behind his back as Frost was attempting to handcuff him. Lloyd said in 2015 that Guilford got off the ground and the altercation ended in a snow-filled ditch, where Guilford was able to get on top of Frost and was hitting him in the face. Frost's body camera came off during the struggle and his SUV had no dash camera. By then, Guilford's cell phone was on the pavement, recording audio but no video.
Attorney Hugh Davis said in 2015 that Guilford's family believed Frost's decision not to wait for other officers before removing Guilford from the car was unreasonable.
Lloyd said in a July 24, 2026 interview with the Free Press that the standard of proof in a criminal case is more stringent than a civil case and he stands by his decision. He said the shooting was justified because the officer reasonably believed his life was in danger.
Former GOP attorneys general Bill Schuette and Mike Cox have criticized Savit for paid outside legal work he's done, while county prosecutor, for a law firm based in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
Cox said the outside work "shows a lack of dedication to the citizens of Washtenaw County." A Savit bio formerly posted on the website of the John K. Dema firm identified his government position, showing Savit "leveraged his job as a Wayne County prosecutor to pitch cases" to potential clients, Cox said.
Savit denies he wooed clients for the firm. He defended the work as helping local governments sue corporate polluters and says he did the work in his spare time until he stopped in 2025 because he was too busy.
A 2026 survey from the Prosecuting Attorneys Coordinating Council, an arm of the Michigan AG's Office, lists Washtenaw as one of 24 counties where the prosecuting attorney is full-time and "private practice (is) prohibited by agreement with county."
Naina Agrawal-Hardin, a spokeswoman for the Savit campaign, said in an Oct. 12 email there is no such agreement with the county and a staffer in the prosecutor's office "inadvertently checked the wrong box" when responding to the survey.
She said Savit earned a little under $17,000 from the firm in 2025, but she would not release Savit's earnings from the Dema firm for 2023 and 2024 as requested by the Free Press. Savit estimates "he has never spent more than an average of 3-4 hours a week on outside environmental matters during any of the years he’s been prosecutor," she said.
Where they differ
Lloyd told the Free Press editorial board Sept. 28 that he would halt the AG's legal efforts to shut down the Enbridge Line 5 pipeline through the Straits of Mackinac.
Savit told the editorial board Sept. 17 he has no current plans to do so.
Lloyd has broadly criticized Democratic Attorney General Dana Nessel's lawsuits against various actions taken by the Trump administration as partisan "lawfare" and suggested he would halt many of them.
Savit has defended the Nessel lawsuits, saying each involves the Trump administration breaking the law and hurting Michigan residents. He said the lawsuits have restored $3.5 billion in federal funding for Michigan.
Contact Paul Egan: 517-372-8660 or pegan@freepress.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: 2 sitting prosecutors are running for AG. That's a Michigan first
