Whitmer Joins Paving Crew to Fix the Damn Roads [VIDEO]

Governor Gretchen Whitmer, whose gubernatorial campaign in 2018 was built on a promise to "fix the damn roads," donned a construction hat and vest in order to do just that.

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A paving welcomed the governor as they patched a stretch of road in Oakland County. Members of the Oakland County Road Commission and Operating Engineers Local 324 showed Whitmer the ropes as they filled potholes in Lake Orion.

Watch Governor Whitmer roll up her sleeves and get to work

In the video below, Whitmer learns just how much work goes into fixing Michigan's crumbling infrastructure. She and a crew member discuss the pros and cons of patching and repatching roads compared to complete asphalt replacement.

"I look at it this way: pothole patching is like a wall in your house," her supervisor for the day tells her. "How many times are you gonna plaster the hole before you replace the wall?"

The governor then used her shovel to scoop asphalt from the truck into a pothole and feather the material out in order to be level with the existing road surface.

Whitmer keeps things light

Joining the road commission crew on Friday (4/16), Whitmer joked that she'd be happy to accompany the crew the next day, saying that she wanted donuts and time-and-a-half in order to work on Saturday.

When the crew shared that they sometimes make interesting finds along the way, the governor quipped that she wanted to find some Michigan beer.