Updated at 6:05 p.m. ET -- Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder called himself "one tough nerd" in his 2010 gubernatorial campaign, fashioning himself as a pragmatic problem-solver who wouldn't delve into the divisive partisanship that had come to define some of his fellow Republicans.

Related: Michigan House passes right-to-work legislation

But now that Snyder has signed historic legislation making Michigan the nation's 24th right-to-work state, detractors will likely lump the governor with those firebrand Republicans, a distinction that he had long sought to avoid.

“I didn’t do this to get into the politics of it,” Snyder said on MSNBC Tuesday afternoon of the fight. He said the issue reached a “critical mass” after organized labor unsuccessfully pushed a ballot initiative this November that would have established a right to collective bargaining in the Michigan constitution.

Snyder had previously said that pursuing this legislation was not on his agenda. But Republicans in the statehouse, whose majorities in the House and Senate will be narrower next year due to the 2012 elections, revived the long-dormant proposal with Snyder's eventual blessing.

"Once we had the support that we had, the next step was convincing the governor that this was a good thing," said state Republican Rep. Marty Knollenberg, a primary sponsor of the bill in the House. "It certainly started from the legislature, and then it was presented to the governor … I think he was sort of taking a wait-and-see attitude. It wasn’t on his priority list, as he indicated."

But Snyder did ultimately embrace the law, and signed it into law on Tuesday evening. Whether he would be able to preserve his reputation as a non-ideologue is an open question.

"I think he kind of decided he couldn’t string this out any longer. The idea that he had some sort of moment where he was converted in a blinding flash of light – I don’t think that’s the case," said Bill Ballenger, editor of the "Inside Michigan Politics" newsletter. "Here you’ve got Michigan looking, all of a sudden, far more extreme and aggressive that Scott Walker. Isn’t that ironic?"

Snyder enjoyed a 51 percent approval rating for Snyder in an early December EPIC-MRA poll; 48 percent of Michiganders said they had a negative impression of Snyder's performance as governor. The same poll found that Snyder had an edge over a generic Democratic challenger in 2014.

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But the state was much more divided on the question of whether the legislature should pursue right-to-work laws. While the EPIC-MRA poll found that Michiganders were generally supportive of the concept of those laws, they were evenly divided – 47 percent in favor, 46 percent against – on the question of whether Michigan should adopt such a law.

Dale G. Young / AP

Governor Rick Snyder presents his views on Michigan's future energy plans and how they merge with environmental and resource management issues at MSU's WK Kellogg Biological Station, Wednesday, Nov. 28, 2012 near Hickory Corners, Mich.

Indeed, Snyder's decision to move forward with this proposal will inevitably invite parallels with GOP Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker's work to push legislation that stripped public employees of their collective bargaining rights in early 2011. Like Michigan, Wisconsin is an industrial Midwestern state with a long tradition of unionism. And as with Wisconsin, Democrats and labor activists stormed the state capitol with unmet hopes of halting the changes to labor law.

“I think it’s important to make a distinction with Wisconsin and Ohio,” Snyder said on MSNBC. “That was about collective bargaining. That was about the relationship between employers and unions. This has nothing to do with that. Right-to-work has to do with the relationship between unions and workers.”

The bigger distinction might be the extent to which Michigan's fight was relatively bloodless. The fight in Wisconsin dragged out for days as Democrats in the state Senate went into hiding in Illinois to try to prevent a vote. And labor fought for months to recall Walker, an election which the Wisconsin governor survived this past June.

The right-to-work law moved much more quickly through Michigan's state government, giving opponents of the law barely any time to stop the bill. Even President Barack Obama's criticism of the law during a stop Monday in Detroit did little to halt the legislation's progress.

That sort of criticism could threaten to erode the reputation Snyder had built for himself during two years in office. Snyder, a former CEO of Gateway Computers, emerged from relative obscurity in 2010 to beat two well-known Republican challengers, Rep. Pete Hoekstra and Attorney General Mike Cox, in the primary on the strengths of his plain-spoken, jobs-oriented message.

Snyder tried to burnish his bipartisan bona fides upon taking office by appointing former State House Speaker Andy Dillon, a Democrat who'd unsuccessfully sought his party's gubernatorial nomination in 2010, as his state treasurer. He had sought to build a new bridge between Detroit and Canada over the opposition of some Republicans, and resisted a GOP initiative to ban domestic partnership benefits for gay and lesbian couples before relenting.

Democrats and their allies in organized labor are sure now to redouble their efforts to beat Snyder in 2014, despite a relatively thin bench of challengers. More voters (40 percent) said they would be less likely to give Snyder a second term if he pursued right-to-work than those who said they would be more likely to re-elect the Republican. 

Michigan will become the nation’s 24th right-to-work state after Republicans in the state legislature approved historic changes to the state’s labor laws over the strenuous objections of Democrats and union members.

The state House, which is controlled by Republicans, voted to bar workplaces from making union membership a condition of employment. Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, a Republican, has said he would sign the law – a symbolically important strike at the organized labor movement in Michigan, a traditional union stronghold.

Paul Sancya / AP

Protesters gather for a rally at the State Capitol in Lansing, Mich., Tuesday, Dec. 11, 2012. The crowd is protesting right-to-work legislation passed last week. Michigan could become the 24th state with a right-to-work law next week.

The House voted 58-41, largely upon party lines, to approve a Senate version of the right-to-work law. The bill will head to Synder for signature.

Related: Michigan passes anti-union measure amid protests

As state lawmakers debated and voted upon the new law, thousands of union members rallied outside the state capitol in Lansing in an ultimately futile show of opposition to the proposal.

Michigan joins Ohio and Wisconsin – two other industrial Midwestern strongholds governed by Republicans in the statehouse – in advancing laws intended to weaken labor rights over the past two years. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, R, led an effort in 2011 to strip public employees of collective bargaining rights, which prompted massive protests and a legislative standoff. It also prompted an effort to recall Walker, which the governor survived this past June. Ohio’s Republican governor, John Kasich, led the effort to pass similar legislation in his state, though it was undone by a subsequent ballot initiative.

Republican lawmakers had sought to ward off a similar ballot initiative by attaching the bill to an appropriations measure, a procedural tactic making the right-to-work law ineligible from a direct challenge at the polls.

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But union members believe they might have a chance to put the right-to-work law before voters as soon as 2014, though the changes to the law would be allowed to take effect in the meanwhile. And opponents of the right-to-work law would have to also meet a higher-than-usual threshold of support to put the question on the ballot.

Democrats vocally criticized the law in the debate preceding the vote, one lawmaker, Douglass Geiss, said there would be “blood” as a result of the law. State Rep. Shanelle Jackson, D, said the law guaranteed Snyder’s defeat in 2014, when he would be up for re-election.

Tuesday’s action makes Michigan the 24th right-to-work state, but only the second state in the Industrial Midwest to pass such a law. Michigan follows Indiana, which passed its right-to-work law in early 2012. Most other right-to-work states are located in the South and Plains states. Proponents of the laws argue that right-to-work laws have allowed those states to attract new jobs and industries, while labor advocates argue that workers in those states are forced to accept lower wages than they might enjoy in states where union membership in workplaces is compulsory. 

Updated 7:39 p.m. — Republicans stand on the cusp of delivering a major blow to organized labor, as they prepare to vote Tuesday on legislation to make Michigan – a state linked to unions in the public conscious – a “right to work” state.

Carlos Osorio / AP

About a dozen members of the Michigan Nurses Association stand on the state Capitol steps in Lansing, Mich., Monday, Dec. 10, 2012, protesting right-to-work legislation.

State lawmakers are expected to approve legislation barring rules in workplaces that make union membership a condition of employment. The offensive would mark the culmination of efforts by Midwestern Republican governors to curb labor rights in the heart of industrial America, where unions once loomed large.

President Barack Obama led Democrats on Monday in a counteroffensive, hoping to stymie Republicans in control of Michigan’s House and Senate, who could act as soon as Tuesday to approve right to work legislation after approving initial versions of the proposed law last week.

Related: Obama decries right-to-work proposal during trip to Michigan

“These so-called right to work laws, they don't have anything to do with economics. They have everything to do with politics,” Obama said in Redford, Mich., where he had planned to travel well before the labor fight erupted last week. "What they're really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money."

But Republicans maintain commanding majorities in Lansing. And Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder has said he would sign the legislation if it reached his desk. With that, he would become the latest Republican governor to be elected in 2010 in a Midwestern state to advance legislation meant to curb labor rights. A familiar battle, which played out with such intensity in other states over the last two years, has now found a new epicenter in Michigan.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker memorably pushed legislation through his statehouse that stripped public employee unions of their collective bargaining rights; his initiative prompted a recall election, which the Republican survived in June. Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s similar effort to curb bargaining rights was only halted when voters reversed such a law through a ballot initiative.

But Michigan Republicans might now succeed in passing a right to work law, a favorite proposal of conservatives that isn’t even on the books in Wisconsin or Ohio. Snyder, who had previously said that seeking such a law wasn’t on his agenda, may now preside over one of the most striking symbolic blows to organized labor in some time.

“I think he's defaulting on his responsibilities,” Michigan Democratic Rep. Sander Levin told NBC News on Monday. “It's a cave to the radical right.”

Levin was among the group of lawmakers who met on Monday with Snyder to plead with him to veto the legislation, or at least delay a vote in the state legislature. Absent that, Levin said Democrats want Republicans to change their proposal to allow for voters to repeal the law through a ballot initiative, as voters did in Ohio. The Michigan law is coupled with an appropriations bill that would exempt it from a popular vote challenge.

Related: Dems launch blitz to halt 'right to work' law in Michigan

“I would have a very difficult time seeing that get changed,” said state Rep. Marty Knollenberg, the chief sponsor of the law in the state House. He contended that the appropriation provision is necessary to help implement the law.

In short, opponents of the Michigan proposal would have little recourse available to challenge the law in the immediate future, making its impact on a union-heavy state like Michigan even more pronounced.

“I think the Republican strategy in doing this so quickly is that they don’t want what Wisconsin had, dragging on for so many days,” said Bill Ballenger, the editor of the influential “Inside Michigan Politics” newsletter. “This is a blitzkrieg, and Republicans hope it’s going to be over and done with tomorrow.

While Republicans in the Michigan Capitol had long pined to advance this law, it languished until after the election. In November, the state’s voters rejected an amendment that would have added a right to collective bargaining to the Michigan state constitution. Amid rumblings that the GOP leadership would resurrect the proposal, it was brought to a vote in the state House and state Senate before organized labor and Democrats were effectively able to mobilize.

Democrats have now turned their attention toward Snyder, who had styled himself as a kind of pragmatic Republican who avoided the ideological trench warfare of his fellow partisans, in halting the law.  According to congressional Democrats, during a meeting with Snyder the governor said he took their concerns “seriously,” though they’re less optimistic privately that he’ll reverse course.

Organized labor groups are organizing a “day of action” on Tuesday in Lansing, including a march to the state capitol that will likely invoke memories of the tens of thousands of activists who flooded the state house in Madison, Wis., during the height of Walker’s legislative battle in 2011.

But Knollenberg said he “can’t think of anything” that would prompt him to back off the legislation. Moreover, Knollenberg suggested it’s state Republican lawmakers – rather than Snyder – who are driving the effort. 

“It certainly started from the legislature, and then it was presented to the governor,” he said.

“It wasn’t on his priority list, as he indicated,” Knollenberg said of Snyder. But once Republicans had gathered adequate support for the proposal, Snyder “adapted his beliefs and saw that this was a real opportunity to put Michigan on the map in terms of creating jobs.”

And as the law’s passage seems more like a fait accompli, Snyder, if nothing else, will join the ranks of Walker and Kasich. All three will be seriously targeted by Democrats and organized labor in 2014, offering a chance for voters to render their verdict on this trio of Republican antagonists.

For their part, Democrats warn that the toxic partisanship that took hold in Wisconsin and Ohio would now spread to Michigan.

“Instead of Michigan united, it becomes Michigan divided,” Levin said. “We’ve gone from a bipartisan effort to deepening partisanship.”

Alternatively, it could enshrine Snyder – a former business executive who postured himself as “one tough nerd” during his 2010 campaign – as a darling of conservatives who wish to further put unions on the defensive.

“For the state, I think it's absolutely monumental,” said Stu Sandler, a Republican consultant in Michigan. “It's the most significant piece of legislation in decades, and sends a very strong signal about the direction the state is heading.”

Warned one senior labor official, "If this bill is signed, it's going to be Thunderdome between now and 2014."

Knollenberg argued his legislation is only about providing opportunity to the state’s workers.

“I just hope that at the end of the day … the unions will then have to sell their story as to why they’re benefiting the workers,” he said. “I believe that if they can demonstrate their value to their workers, they’ll do fine. But they’re going to have to work for it.”

Update: Not all hope was lost for supporters of organized labor, who believe they would be able to use a citizens initiative under Michigan law to eventually challenge the right-to-work law. Under such a scenario, if labor supporters could gather a higher number of signatories to a petition, they could force a vote to undo the law in 2014. However, the new right-to-work law would be allowed to take effect in the meanwhile.

REDFORD, MICH. – President Barack Obama traveled Monday to Michigan to tout a new investment in domestic auto jobs, while using the opportunity to assail the state's Republican lawmakers for pursuing "right to work" legislation.

Obama renewed his offensive to pressure Republicans into extending middle class tax cuts, calling on Congress to pass legislation making the Bush-era tax rates for those making below $250,000 permanent.

But this trip to the Detroit-area came with some extra baggage in the form of a state-wide union battle over a right-to-work law that Michigan’s governor, Rick Snyder (R) has pledged to sign. The president addressed the union controversy towards the middle of his remarks:

"We should do everything we can to encourage companies like Daimler to keep investing in American workers," Obama said, "what we shouldn’t be doing is trying to take away your rights to bargain for better wages and working conditions."

Related: Lawmakers implore Michigan gov. to halt or delay 'right to work' law

The audience responded enthusiastically as  the president continued: "These so-called right-to-work laws, they don't have to do with economics. They have everything to do with politics. What they're really talking about is giving you the right to work for less money."

While Snyder did not join the president for his event at the Daimler-owned Detroit Diesel Corporation, the governor did greet Obama on the tarmac along with some of  the Democratic members of  Michigan’s congressional delegation.

Snyder had a meeting with many members of the Michigan delegation earlier today to discuss the legislation, which would make mandatory payment of union dues or fees as a condition of employment illegal. On the flight to Michigan, White House Press Secretary Jay Carney noted that the president’s opposition to right-to-work laws was “well known” and the optics of this were brought even more into focus by the president being accompanied on his tour of the engine plant by the UAW NW Local 163 Detroit Diesel Engine Unit Shop Chairperson Mark Gibson, and multiple people in the crowd sporting UAW stickers. Currently, 23 states and Guam have some type of right-to-work legislation on the books.

Saul Loeb / AFP - Getty Images

President Barack Obama speaks on the economy and fiscal cliff negotiations after touring the Daimler Detroit Diesel Plant in Redford, Michigan, December 10, 2012.

But while the president was on the tour of the Redford engine plant, the clock continued to tick towards the end of the year and the so-called fiscal cliff. Obama again insisted that tax rates on the wealthiest Americans should be allowed to go up,

"What you need is a package that keeps taxes where they are for middle-class families," he said. "We make some tough spending cuts on things that we don't need, and then we ask the wealthiest Americans to pay a slightly higher tax rate. And that's a principle I won't compromise on."

He didn’t mention his meeting over the weekend with House Speaker John Boehner, choosing instead to focus the blame on Congress if taxes go up for everyone at the end of the year.

"If Congress doesn't act soon -- meaning in the next few weeks -- starting on Jan. 1, everybody's going to see their income taxes go up. It's true,” the president said.  The audience loudly booed and the president responded, “You all don't like that.”

Michigan's congressional delegation met Monday with Gov. Rick Snyder, asking him to veto or at least delay a vote on a "right to work" law moving through the state's legislature.

Democrats and organized labor groups have launched an all-out blitz they are hoping might halt legislation that would establish workers' rights to employment in a workplace without having to join a union. The Republican-held state legislature passed versions of the legislation last week, and are set to bring it up for final consideration as soon as Tuesday.

Snyder, a first-term Republican governor who's fashioned himself as a more pragmatic leader, has said he would sign the bill if it came to his desk.

"We strongly urged the governor to veto the so-called right to work bill, or at a minimum, ask the legislature to delay the vote on it," Sen. Carl Levin said in a conference call to describe Democrats' meeting with the governor. "The governor listened, and he told us that he would 'seriously,' in his words, consider our concerns."

Snyder's office had no immediate reaction to Democrats' characterization of the meeting.

Michigan has become the latest Midwestern epicenter over labor rights as a result of this fight, following Ohio and Wisconsin. The Republican governors of those states led efforts to curb or eliminate collective bargaining rights for public employees' unions.

Alex Wong / Getty Images

Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Carl Levin

National Democrats have begun to wade into the fight as well, issuing blistering statements warning against the Michigan proposal. The fight could be elevated further this afternoon, when President Barack Obama visits the Detroit area in a previously-scheduled trip.

Democrats are particularly incensed by a procedural move used by Republican authors of the bill which would prevent the law from being challenged by a statewide referendum. The Democrats who met Monday with Snyder said they had also urged the governor to change that provision, so that the right to work proposal could be brought to a popular vote.

Updated 2:12 p.m. - President Barack Obama's campaign launched a pair of ads in Michigan defending the 2009 auto bailout, ostensibly in response to a pro-Romney super PAC airing ads in the Wolverine State.

The president's campaign released an upbeat spot, "What He Said," touting the bailout of GM and Chrysler, and "Cynical," an ad meant to combat the misleading spots run by Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney that stoked fears that Jeep would move some of its production to China, at the expense of U.S. jobs.

The Obama campaign has bought airtime in Ohio specifically to run these states in the Buckeye State, along with Michigan. But don't be so quick to assume that putting these ads on Detroit television is all about putting Michigan in play.

As with Detroit's newspapers, several of the Motor City's networks bleed into northwest Ohio and television packages in Toledo. That's prime battleground turf in Ohio -- and, it's the home of a major Jeep production plant, a central part of the recent squabbling on autos.

The Romney campaign said in response: "President Obama can’t run from the facts. As a result of his handling of the auto bailout, American taxpayers stand to lose $25 billion and GM and Chrysler are expanding their production overseas. Unlike President Obama, Mitt Romney has a comprehensive plan to revive manufacturing, create millions of good-paying jobs, and deliver real change and a real recovery."

DETROIT -- Amid a GOP-driven effort asking whether Americans are better off than they were four years ago, Vice President Joe Biden emphatically declared that "America is better off" now than at the end of the Bush administration.

"Folks, let me say something to you, say it to the press," Biden said at the conclusion of his remarks at a Labor Day rally here in the Motor City. "America is better off today than they left us when they left!"

The question, a staple of elections in which an incumbent is seeking re-election, has developed into a small media imbroglio since surrogates for President Barack Obama appeared hesitant this weekend to give a positive answer.

Democratic Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley answered that question with a "no"; Obama advisers David Axelrod and David Plouffe offered nuanced responses but not a flat "yes."

Republicans pounced in the meanwhile, and the GOP held a press conference today in Charlotte, the site of the Democratic National Convention, to push that very question.

Biden's statement makes him the highest-ranking Obama surrogate to weigh in on the back and forth. 

Repeating his frequent "bumper sticker" mantra, Biden said in Detroit: "If you want to know whether we're better off, I got a bumper sticker for you: Osama bin Laden is dead and General Motors is alive!"

Romney spokeswoman Amanda Henneberg said in response: "Today, Vice President Biden claimed that Americans are better off than they were four years ago, directly contradicting what President Obama and his campaign surrogates have said. The truth is that the middle class has been crushed in the Obama economy."

Biden, who spoke to several hundred supporters at the AFL-CIO-sponsored event, focused heavily on labor issues in his remarks and blasted Romney for opposing the Obama-backed bailout of the auto industry.

"Folks, you can't say you're going to create jobs in the United States of America when you were willing to let 1m jobs go under by the liquidation of the automobile plants he suggested," Biden said.

He also went after Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan, repeating a line first debuted yesterday in Pennsylvania to attack the Wisconsin congressman's Medicare plans.

"We're talking about making sure to protect Medicare. They're talking about creating an entire new system, 'Vouchercare,'" he said, warning "if they win, people are in trouble."

BLOOMFIELD HILLS, Mich. — Presumptive Republican vice presidential nominee Paul Ryan was joined by a very special guest tonight at a fundraiser in a Detroit suburb: rockstar Kid Rock.

Michigan native Kid Rock, singer of the Romney campaign’s unofficial theme song ‘Born Free,’ joined Ryan — an avid rock music fan — and roughly 160 others at the affluent Oakland Hills Country Club here.

“I was going to come out, be a little wisenheimer and say, 'Guess which one is running for vice president,'” Kid Rock, who wore a white fedora, told the crowd inside a ballroom on the main floor about his original plan “Then they would introduce Paul and I would walk out and say hello.”

Ryan, the seven-term Wisconsin congressman, was not shy to admit he is a fan of the popular singer.

“So one of us is running for vice president but only one of us listened to 'Bawitdaba' on the way over here in the motorcade with the Secret Service,” Ryan said of Kid Rock's breakout single to laughs. “I’ve been listening to Kid Rock for a long, long time.”

While the campaign would not directly confirm if guests knew in advance Kid Rock’s presence tonight at the fundraiser within Bloomfield Township, where Mitt Romney's family once lived, one man did bring a large guitar to the country club asking for an autograph.

Guests paid anywhere from $500 to $20,000 to get a glimpse of the congressman and Kid Rock. No estimation was available by the campaign for how much was raised. It isn't the first time Bob Ritchie — Kid Rock's given name — has appeared at an event on Romney's behalf; Kid Rock and his band performed "Born Free" at a culminating rally for Romney shortly before the pivotal Michigan primary. 

Friday night’s event – the first of two fundraisers for Ryan tonight – followed a public campaign event featuring both Romney and Ryan in the state the presumptive GOP presidential nominee was born.

Ryan’s first fundraiser in The Great Lakes State had its share of politics and attacks as well.

He specifically mentioned former Democratic President Bill Clinton for the first time since being tapped as the VP candidate in an attempt to illustrate the difference between Clinton and President Barack Obama.

“What we want to do is not just beat up the other guy and try to win by default, that is what President Obama is going to do. He can’t run on his record, he didn’t moderate his positions like Bill Clinton did, he went hard to the left.,” Ryan said. “So he is going to have to divide, distract, demagogue, distort to try and win by default.”

And the harsh words for President Obama didn’t end there.

“You know he speaks to people as if they are stuck in their station in life. As if they are victims of circumstance outside their control and the government is here to help them cope. That is cynical. That is not freedom," Ryan said.

The Wisconsin lawmaker, who characterized Michigan as one of a “handful of states” that will determine the election, heads to the battleground state of Ohio on Saturday to campaign again with running mate.

Updated 12:48 p.m. — COMMERCE, MI — Mitt Romney cracked a joke about his own birth certificate while campaigning Friday here in his native Michigan, instantly and perhaps inadvertently inserting himself into one of the most divisive controversies in the Obama presidency.

In a riff on Friday about being back in the state where he was born and raised, presumptive GOP presidential nominee made a joke alluding to the "birther" controversies that have dogged President Obama. 

Expanding on his Michigander bonafides, he pointed out that he was born in nearby Harper hospital, adding:

"No one has ever asked to see my birth certificate," Romney said. "They know that this is the place that we were born and raised."

Romney did not mention President Obama or controversy over his place of birth, but many in the crowd of thousands here laughed knowingly at the line.

A Romney spokesman sought to soften the remark, telling reporters: "Governor Romney was just illustrating that he was born and raised here in Michigan."

The comment drew immediate attention for invoking conspiracy theories about the president's place of birth, voiced by some conservative quarters of the GOP. These theories have been vocally espoused by Donald Trump, the reality TV star and real estate mogul who's been an active ally of Romney's this cycle.

An Obama spokesman, Ben LaBolt, shot back: "Throughout this campaign, Governor Romney has embraced the most strident voices in his party instead of standing up to them.  It’s one thing to give the stage in Tampa to Donald Trump, Sheriff Arpaio, and Kris Kobach.  But Governor Romney’s decision to directly enlist himself in the birther movement should give pause to any rational voter across America.”

Trump had kept the so-called "birther" controversy alive long after it had been debunked, calling for President Obama to release his long-form birth certificate last spring to prove that he was a natural born American citizen. Romney's campaign has kept its distance from Trump's remarks, with Romney repeatedly saying he believes the president was born in the United States, and that he did not agree with Trump's comments.

(Obama has released his birth certificate, which shows he was born in Hawaii.)

The comment nonetheless was reflective of the personal nastiness that has seeped into the Obama-Romney campaign. 

Evan Vucci / AP

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney and his wife Ann arrive at the Oakland County International Airport Aug. 24 in Waterford, Mich.

The president, for instance, made a similar endeavor onto this turf when he joked about Romney putting a his dog on the roof of his car in the 1980s.

"During a speech a few months ago, Gov. Romney even described his energy policy this way, I’m quoting here, ‘You can’t drive a car with a windmill on it,'" Obama said earlier this month in Iowa during a trip to promote wind energy. 

"Now I don’t know if he’s actually tried that — I know he’s had other things on his car," Obama added in a joke he'd end up repeating several times that day.

Paul Sancya / AP

Vice President Joe Biden greets Lawrence Smith, 8, and Madison King, 9, both of Van Buren Township, Mich., during a campaign stop at Renaissance High School, Wednesday, Aug. 22, 2012, in Detroit.

DETROIT -- For Joe Biden, all politics is personal, from his relationships with past presidents to the little white lies his siblings told their ailing mother.

Campaigning Wednesday in famously recession-ravaged Michigan, Biden bemoaned the consequences of the GOP ticket's plans for Medicare and said that their proposed changes would exacerbate the sacrifices already made by families on behalf of their elderly relatives.

Noting that he and his siblings have been financially successful, the vice president offered the delicate details of his family members combining financial resources to care for mother Catherine "Jean" Biden, who died in 2010 at the age of 92.

"It was still a struggle to take care of all my mom's bills," he told a crowd of over a thousand at Renaissance High School. "We were able to do it, no complaint, it was an honor. But you know what it did, we had to lie to my mom and tell her, 'No honey, this is all covered by your Medicare, this is all covered by the sale of your home,' which it wasn't."

"Because do you know any parent who wants to be a burden for their children?" he added, arguing that the "voucherization" of Medicare proposed under the Ryan budget would further hurt the elderly's abilities to cover their own expenses.

The vice president, who commonly cites his personal friendship with President Barack Obama, compared the current leader of the free world with the gaggle of other commanders-in-chief he says he's known personally.

"I've known eight presidents, three of them intimately," noted the six-term senator after citing the "four to six hours a day" he typically spends with Obama. "I have never once in the difficult decisions he's had to make heard him ask me or anyone else 'what are the politics of this for me?'"

Perhaps the most resonant endorsement of the Obama ticket on Wednesday came not from Biden but from his introducer, 17-year old Olympic gold medalist Claressa Shields, a boxer from Flint, Mich.

Paul Sancya / AP

Vice President Joe Biden introduces Olympic boxing gold medalist Claressa Shields during a campaign stop at Renaissance High School, Wednesday, Aug. 22, 2012, in Detroit.

"It's pretty cool knowing when you represent your country, you've got a president and a vice president who represent you," said Shields, who was greeted with wild applause. "We've had tough times in Michigan, but we never give up. We just get up and keep going."

That message - and Shield's famed toughness - were echoed by Biden as he praised the Motor City's resilience.

"My dad used to say the measure of a man or woman wasn't whether they got knocked down but how quickly they got back up," he said. "And guess what? Detroit's getting back up!"

WATERFORD, Mich. -- Former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty laughed off "lame" questions Thursday about whether he'd be interested in a cabinet position in a Mitt Romney administration if he isn't selected as the GOP's vice presidential candidate.

"It would be presumptuous and premature for people to be talking about positions down the road," he told reporters at a cabinetry store outside of Detroit, poking at the press for the pun on "cabinets."

"And for me I'm just happy to help [Gov. Romney] as a volunteer. I'm happy to be working in the private sector and on other projects, so beyond that I don't have any plans," he added.

Pawlenty, who is widely discussed as being a possible partner for Romney on the GOP ticket, appeared in eastern Michigan as part of a fundraising tour on the GOP nominee's behalf. As a former governor who no longer serves in elected office or has a professional post other than his membership on a bevy of business boards, he would be a prime candidate for a job in Romney's administration should he be passed over for the No. 2 slot.

In addition to a peppering of questions from reporters eager to match his schedule with a possible secret veep rollout, he fielded inquiries about the Romney campaign's new television advertisements.

Asked about a new ad that links President Obama's contraception coverage policy with a "war on religion," Pawlenty pointed to Romney's past comment that available contraceptives are "working just fine."

"I think Gov. Romney said it best in one of the televised debates when he said contraceptives are working fine and we should leave them alone," he said, referencing  January debate in New Hampshire. "And to his point on religious liberties he was referring to the fact that the Obama administration has imposed new limitations on the exercise of religion and has offended the many leaders of the Catholic church and other faith leaders in that regard."

Touring the cabinetry facility with owners Rik and Mike Kowall, the former Minnesota governor munched on donuts and chatted about the impact of economic uncertainty on small businesses.

"Who decides what music you play?" he joked with one employee as Dire Straits' hit "Money for Nothing" blared in the workroom.

Pawlenty is expected to travel to New Hampshire for a busy slate of public events on Saturday.