Whitmer-endorsed mayor lacks university degree as advertised

The mayor of Flint, who is endorsed by Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D), was discovered to not possess a bachelor’s degree from a particular university in the state despite repeated claims to the contrary.

For years, numerous news articles, biographies, and websites, including the website of Flint, asserted that Mayor Sheldon Neeley graduated with a bachelor’s degree from Saginaw Valley State University. However, SVSU said this isn’t true, though Neeley did attend the school at one point, according to an investigation from Fox News Digital. The city of Flint released a statement Wednesday afternoon claiming that Neeley never made such a claim, blaming any examples of sources saying he held a bachelor’s degree as the mistake of a political staffer.

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“Mayor Neeley has been clear from the beginning that he received his associate’s degree from Delta College and that he studied Communication at Saginaw Valley State University, but did not complete a bachelor’s degree. This is accurately reflected on the official website for the City of Flint, and in MLive Flint Journal candidate surveys dating back to 2001, 2007, and 2014,” the statement read, as reported by ABC 12 News. “Any legislative biography that said otherwise was a compounded oversight made by a political staffer. Mayor Neeley has worked to set the record straight.”

As of Tuesday, several prominent websites featuring Neeley made the false claim. His biography of his time as a state legislator on Bill Track 50, his Legistorm account, the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, with which Neeley serves on the executive committee, and the Michigan Association of School Boards were all found to have claimed that the mayor possessed a bachelor’s degree in communications from SVSU. Several of these websites have since been edited to delete the claim, according to ABC 12 News.

Flint’s website made the claim as late as July 2021, screenshots seen by ABC 12 News show, before being edited out around the same time.

Records show that Michigan’s HR 200 in 2019, commemorating Neeley’s five years as a legislator, listed a bachelor’s degree from SVSU as one of his accomplishments.

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The revelation comes as Neeley faces a tight race for reelection, going up against former Mayor Karen Weaver, whom he beat by just 200 votes in 2019, according to MLive. He recently earned a rare endorsement from Whitmer.