Michigan chatbots still split almost evenly as markets move toward Rogers
Betting markets shifted toward Mike Rogers this week while chatbot answers and polls barely budged, keeping the race close in two of three signals.
Oct 13, 2026. Written by Claude Sonnet 5 and checked by GPT-5.5, from Voting Monitor's data. No person reviewed this article before it was published. How this is made · Report an error
What moved
Betting markets moved toward Republican Mike Rogers over the past week, the only one of the three signals to shift by a notable amount. Chatbot answers and polls both held roughly steady.
The overall split among chatbots was nearly even, with Democrat Abdul El-Sayed picked in 51 percent of answers and Rogers in 48 percent. That is barely changed from a week earlier, when the gap was similarly thin.
Chatbots split down the middle
Ask Claude Sonnet 5, Gemini 3.6 Flash or GPT-5.4 mini and the answer comes back a dead-even 50-50 between El-Sayed and Rogers. GPT-5.5 was the most favorable to El-Sayed, picking him in 63 percent of its answers. Grok 4.3 was the outlier, picking Rogers in 59 percent of its answers, about 19 points more often than it picked El-Sayed. Grok 4.5 and Claude Haiku 4.5 also leaned toward Rogers, while Gemini 3.1 Pro leaned the other way, favoring El-Sayed. Minor-party candidates barely registered. Tim Long and Lydia Christensen each drew a handful of chatbot mentions this week, tied to U.S. Taxpayers and Libertarian positions on taxes and immigration, but neither broke above single digits.
Markets still sit apart from the chatbots
The gap between chatbot answers and betting markets remained clear. Markets now give El-Sayed about 68 percent and Rogers about 33 percent, while chatbots put El-Sayed at 51 percent and Rogers at 48 percent, a gap of roughly 15 to 17 points on each candidate. The market move this week was toward Rogers, while chatbot answers held roughly steady.
Polls, last updated by Big Data Poll in late September and standing context rather than new news, put El-Sayed at 47 percent and Rogers at 44 percent. That is close to where the chatbots land, within about 4 points on each candidate, while markets price the race as more lopsided.
What to watch
Markets were the one signal to move this week, so it is worth watching whether that shift toward Rogers continues or chatbot answers start to follow it as the November general election approaches.
In the chatbots' own words
Verbatim answers from this week, chosen by the writing model and printed as the chatbot wrote them.
as Mike Rogers' platform prioritizes strict border enforcement and reducing unlawful immigration, whereas his opponent Abdul El-Sayed advocates for abolishing ICE and creating pathways to citizenship.
Gemini 3.1 Pro, Oct 13, 2026, asked about immigration (restrict framing) as a Macomb County voter. Picked Mike Rogers.
because as the U.S. Taxpayers Party nominee, Tim Long's platform is fundamentally dedicated to minimizing the federal tax burden, eliminating the national debt, and strictly limiting federal spending.
Gemini 3.1 Pro, Oct 12, 2026, asked about federal taxes with no voter profile. Picked Tim Long.
What changed this week in the Michigan Senate race
Change in share points versus Oct 6, 2026. Movement that clears the noise gate this week: the markets.
Which AI models pick whom in the Michigan Senate race
Share of each model's own answers naming each candidate, last 7 days, same weighting as the panel figure. The panel's most common pick is Abdul El-Sayed; Grok 4.3 is the model that disagrees most, picking Mike Rogers by a 19pp margin over the panel favourite.