The chanting continued for several minutes before the demonstrators were escorted from the rally by authorities.

Amid more than a year of fighting in the Middle East, Trump has appealed to Arab Americans and Muslim Michiganders to support his candidacy. Last weekend, he brought figures from those communities to the stage at his Novi rally.

In a warm-up speech at the Monday meeting, Wayne County Deputy Director Assad Turfe called Harris’ election the best chance for peace in the region, arguing that Trump would “only bring more chaos and suffering.”

CHIPS debate

Harris made two other stops in Michigan earlier Monday to discuss manufacturing policy: a union facility in Macomb County and Hemlock Semiconductor near Saginaw.

The Biden-Harris administration last week announced a $325 million grant to Hemlock to build a new manufacturing facility to produce and purify semiconductor-grade hyperpure polysilicon. The project is expected to create almost 180 manufacturing jobs, along with more than 1,000 temporary jobs in the construction sector.

The award came via the federal CHIPS and Science Act, which Biden signed in 2022 in an effort to boost domestic microchip production and deter Chinese market dominance.

Trump criticized the bipartisan CHIPS Act on Friday, calling it “so bad” for the country.

“We allocated billions of dollars to wealthy corporations,” but “all you had to do was charge them tariffs,” Trump said in an interview with podcast host Joe Rogan, repeating his disputed claim that taxing of imports would stimulate domestic mass production.

“You tax it so high that they come and build their chip companies for nothing,” Trump added.

Several U.S. industries still rely heavily on imported chips, especially those made in Taiwan, the world’s largest producer.

But the CHIPS Act will help fund “exactly the kind of work that’s happening here,” Harris said Monday after touring Hemlock. “We have created tax credits for the private sector to do this work,” she added. “That’s good work.”

Social security insolvency

As Harris worked to expand the youth vote in Ann Arbor, she and Walz also spoke to what he called the “gray hairs” in the liberal city.

Harris claimed Trump will “cut” Social Security. “Economists even say he will bankrupt Social Security in the next six years,” she said.

Trump has pledged to “fight for and protect Social Security” and has proposed no immediate cuts. However, his various proposals to cut taxes, impose tariffs and deport immigrants would “dramatically worsen Social Security’s finances,” according to the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

The Social Security trust fund is expected to fail as early as 2035. Trump’s plans would accelerate the projected insolvency timeline to fiscal year 2031 — six years after he takes office, according to the analysis.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget predicts that Harris’ plans would also increase the federal deficit — but not as much as Trump’s and “would not have a major impact on the insolvency of the Social Security trust fund.”