DEARBORN — In today’s political age, it seems as if the best way to win an important race is to spend more money on advertising than the next candidate.

But after her win in the Democratic primary election (with 44% of the vote) for State Representative in Michigan’s 12th House District, Rashida Tlaib is giving most of the credit to her throwback approach to winning over local voters. Tlaib had a feeling she was going to win but said she was ecstatic about the high percentage of votes she received.

“I was really happy (about the win), I worked a lot and one of the things about it is I became a true believer in the grassroots campaign,” said Tlaib.

“People remembered me coming to their house, at least my first name, and they supported me because of the door-knocking and the grassroots campaign.”

Tlaib knocked on over 7,000 doors in the district during her campaign. That kind of personal attention was a big factor in Tlaib’s win, and she hopes it will be a big part of her tenure in office.

Of course, there’s still the matter of beating the Republican candidate in November, but in the case of the 12th District, the Democratic candidate winning is almost a forgone conclusion. The vote is usually over 90% in favor of the Democratic candidate for the 12th District, which is located in Southwest Detroit and features a diverse population of groups like Mexican, Arab, black, and Polish residents.

With that in mind, Tlaib is focusing more on reaching out to the community and preparing for her time in office.

“I’m starting to have one-on-ones with various community members and people who want to sit down and talk to me, however, I don’t want to spend too many resources in bombarding people that are obviously going to vote for the Democratic candidate,” she said.

The main goal will be to impact the community on a personal level and to create an office where the door is always open for people to come in and get advice and other services. Tlaib grew up in Southwest Detroit, a mostly lower-class area, and she knows the people there need assistance with everyday problems.

“My focus is on creating an office where people can come in with any kind of issues,” said Tlaib. “If you’re losing your home and need help getting taxes done, free legal services, translation services, access to non-profits for help with utility bills, things like that.”

Keeping the office up to snuff and expanding it after current State Rep. Steve Toboccman departs will be a challenge, considering that it must be paid for through fund-raising, but it’s something Tlaib feels the community desperately needs. Such offices are rare in the state of Michigan but the 12th District one is especially important because it offers services in Arabic and Spanish in order to service the diverse community.

Tlaib has heard first-hand about the problems the area is facing, including the break-ins near Lonyo and Dayton Streets in Southwest Detroit at mostly Arab houses, and she has already talked to many of the people who have had their homes broken into.

“I’ve had my house broken into 21 times in Southwest Detroit and I’ve never seen it as bad as some of the houses I saw,” said Tlaib, noting things like stolen chandeliers and furniture turned over, making houses look as if they were ravaged by tornadoes.

Tlaib acknowledges that the Detroit Police department has issues with the reliability and speed of their responses, so she plans to help set up neighborhood watches and to explore other ways to make the community feel safer.

She looks forward to serving her community should she win in November, and if she does, she will become both the first Palestinian and first Muslim woman to the serve in the state legislature. While the accomplishment would mean a lot to Tlaib, it’s not something she thinks about very often. She wants to help everyone in Southwest Detroit regardless of their background and tries to deflect the attention from race.

“I’m honored and thrilled; for me, it wasn’t about that, but it’s a nice plus,” she said. “It was really nice when I started door-knocking and ran into Palestinians. Something about being another Palestinian just makes their faces glow, they were so overwhelmingly proud and could not believe a Palestinian was running for office.”