“I think rather than talk about being its first black governor, I think what’s most important is that I’d be a governor who’s committed to working on behalf of all of our citizens,” Cobbs said. “I don’t think that my being black should be a factor.”

What would it mean for Michigan to elect the state’s second female governor after Jennifer Granholm?

“I think more than anything what it means is that we would finally have a progressive governor who knows how to get things done and get this state back on a trajectory where we are leading,” Whitmer said.

The candidates’ reluctance to talk about race, ethnicity, religion or gender — or spend much time bashing Trump — might be due in part to Hillary Clinton’s failed Democratic presidential campaign, said Matt Grossmann, director of the Institute for Public Policy and Social Research at Michigan State University.

Clinton’s campaign was heavy on slamming the New York billionaire’s character and promoting diversity, but she still lost reliable Democratic-leaning states such as Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan.

Whitmer suggested she won’t make the same mistake.

“They weren’t inspired by the message,” the 46-year-old former state Senate minority leader said. “They didn’t see how anyone’s plan was going to, you know, improve their lives. We’re not going to make that mistake.”

Research shows white voters who are reminded that demographic trends mean they could be a minority within 30 years tend to respond to questionnaires more conservatively and with more support for Trump in particular, Grossmann said.

Any white anxiety of becoming a racial or ethnic minority “might mean it’s not a great idea to run on a ‘diversity is good’ message kind of by default,” he said.

A Target-Insyght survey of 377 likely Democratic primary voters in late July found the Whitmer and Fieger tied at 35 percent each in a hypothetical match-up. El-Sayed and Thanedar were at 4 percent and 3 percent, respectively. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 5.35 percentage points and was paid for by the Michigan Information & Research Service.

Grossmann said he doesn’t think race, ethnicity, religion or sex will have much to do with who ends up winning the primary. Whitmer’s popularity is likely driven by her party connections, he said.

Questionnaires show people tend to harbor more negative attitudes toward Muslims than blacks, Latinos, whites or Christians, Grossmann said.

In Michigan — where a Kalkaska village president remains in office despite sharing a Facebook post that called for killing “every last Muslim” — the bias has translated into groups attacking El-Sayed over his faith.

A state organization called Secure Michigan — which says it focuses on how the U.S. refugee resettlement program hurts Michigan — links to articles suggesting, without proof, that El-Sayed has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. The website links to an article suggesting that El-Sayed is part of a vast conspiracy to wage “civilization jihad” and another to a site called “Bare Naked Islam” that claims, “It isn’t Islamophobia when they really ARE trying to kill you.”

Secure Michigan spokesman Dick Manasseri declined to comment on the articles the group’s website hosts or his concern about El-Sayed.

“Anyone with any rational sense knows that there’s no truth to that,” said Asha Noor, a representative for the Michigan chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations. “He has a lot of support in the state … but there will always be sort of a concerted effort to tear down anyone who has a Muslim-sounding name or who happens to be Muslim in this political climate that we’re in.”

At a recent Hillsdale County Democrats meeting, white Democrats who attended El-Sayed’s speech appeared inspired.

“Oh, I’d vote for him in a minute,” said Heather Allison, an 80-year-old Jackson resident who drove to Hillsdale with three others.

During his speech, he advocated for equal and high-quality education throughout the state, overcoming health disparities between urban minority and affluent white areas, and a “shared future” that unites everyone.

“A lot of people have told me, ‘Abdul, you’re an unlikely leader for this because you’re kind of young,’ ” El-Sayed said in Hillsdale. “And what they don’t say also is, ‘You’re kind of brown and kind of Muslim.’ ”

“My constitution tells me that there shall be no religious test to leadership,” he continued.

Allison and others in Hillsdale said they loved the message. But some doubted whether Michigan is open-minded enough to elect a Muslim candidate.

“I think today, the way the world is, it’s going to be a problem,” Allison said. “It’s not for me.”

mgerstein@detroitnews.com