Is ‘True Gretch’ pure Michigan?

Gretchen Whitmer’s memoir, True Gretch, couldn’t have been released at a more suspect time. As the Michigan governor disavows calls for Joe Biden to step down as the Democratic nominee, the book and its subsequent national tour seem to indicate that a self-interested plot is in the works. And without any disastrous revelations about shooting her dog, it could very well work. 

True Gretch hides Whitmer’s national ambitions behind the facade of a relatable working mom. The memoir is divided into self-help entitled chapters, like “Be a Happy Warrior” and “Seek to Understand,” with examples of Whitmer overflowing with the eponymous virtue in each. She’s real Midwestern nice, for example, and once even sent a birthday cake to a state senator who called her “batshit crazy.” True Gretch is also about being authentic, which in this case means painting Whitmer as just another beer-drinking Michigander. It’s why the book is full of family photos, playlists, her grandmother’s clover rolls recipe and shameless plugs for merchandise. 

The memoir also capitalizes on being a woman in politics. Whitmer recalls how her life and body were put into the spotlight upon becoming governor. After her first State of the Union address, for example, Whitmer was outraged at the media’s attention to her fashion rather than her policy. “The following evening, the Detroit Fox News affiliate aired a story on… my dress,” she wrote. “Or rather, on the comments people made about it, and more specifically about my body, on Fox 2’s Facebook page. The comments Fox 2 chose to highlight read like a giant sexist haiku.”

Whitmer also recalled the time a man told her she looked slimmer in person than on TV and when a woman was relieved she was finally buying better-fitting bras. “No matter how many times it happens, I’m somehow always surprised at the things people are willing to say not only about me, but to me.”

Whitmer isn’t afraid to be vulnerable either and explained how she’s gotten some of her more unflattering nicknames, including Greedy Gretchen, Gravity Gretchen and That Woman from Michigan. Unfortunately the book doesn’t reveal the origins of Cockburn’s personal favorite Stretchin Gretchin — although it does detail the time she was so hungover she threw up on her high school principal. 

While she has mellowed out since her teenage years, True Gretch paints the picture of an ever spunky rebel. It was as a middle-aged woman, after all, that Whitmer decided to get two tattoos, a smiley face and a shark. The shark is a nod to her obsession with the phrase, “It’s Shark Week, motherfucker,” apparently a euphemism for menstruation. After a video of Whitmer mouthing the phrase before the 2020 Democratic National Convention went viral, she plastered it on her shoulder permanently. 

Much of the memoir is devoted to Whitmer’s draconian handling of Covid-19 and the ensuing death threats it earned her, both of which catapulted her to national fame. True Gretch doubles down on banning outdoor activities and closing whole sections of retail stores, although Whitmer did apologize for the one time she was caught unmasked in a Lansing dive bar less than six feet apart from her friends. She described it as “one of her biggest flubs in politics” but also downplayed it via comparison. After all, the incident really isn’t as bad as Gavin Newsom dining at the French Laundry. “Gavin and I have that in common — even though he was dining at a Michelin three-star restaurant and I was in a dive bar,” she wrote. Watch out Gavin, Whitmer is eyeing the White House.