An Abdul El-Sayed Victory Would Be a Defeat for Democrats

I have spent my adult life working to elect Democrats. I began as an intern in the Clinton White House, held senior-level campaign roles for Sen. Chuck Schumer, Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Gov. Wes Moore, President Biden’s super PAC, and served as a Biden delegate to the Democratic National Convention. The Democratic Party has been my political home. That is precisely why I believe it is so important to speak out against Abdul El-Sayed’s candidacy for the U.S. Senate. With a child at the University of Michigan, this election is personal. But its consequences extend far beyond Michigan.

An El-Sayed victory would send a dangerous message to Democrats across the country that inflammatory rhetoric, tolerance of antisemitism and alliances with extremists are not political liabilities but a viable path to national office. That lesson could shape the party for years.

Inflammatory accusations against Israel are not merely a feature of El-Sayed’s political identity. They ARE his political identity. In an April CNN interview, asked whether Israel’s government was as evil as Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, he answered: “Yes.” When El-Sayed later declined to distinguish Israel from Iran as threats to America, fellow Democrat Pete Buttigieg clarified the distinction: “Iran is our enemy. Israel is not. They’re an ally, so that’s pretty clear to me.”

He has spoken of American tax dollars “killing other people’s children in Israel”. His sweeping accusations of genocide and apartheid against Israel are patently false, and his rhetoric about the killing of children to be a modern-day blood libel. Such rhetoric inflames antisemitism, normalizes hostility toward Jews and puts Jewish communities at risk.

His association with Hasan Piker is deeply disturbing. Piker campaigned with El-Sayed during the Democratic primary. At Cornell University, Piker joined a crowd chanting, “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

Just days before the election, Piker compared pro-Israel voters in West Bloomfield, a heavily Jewish Detroit suburb, to members of the Ku Klux Klan, accusing them of “Jewish supremacy.” In that community, Temple Israel was targeted in a Hezbollah-inspired terrorist attack earlier this year, with preschool children inside. El-Sayed condemned the attack but later used the phrase “hurt people hurt people,” for which he subsequently apologized.

Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin, who endorsed El-Sayed, condemned Piker’s remarks as antisemitic, divisive and deeply offensive.

The concern extends beyond Hasan Piker. On Thursday, El-Sayed appeared at a campaign event alongside Mayor Marcus Muhammad, whom the Washington Free Beacon identifies as a Nation of Islam student minister and supporter of Louis Farrakhan. Muhammad has promoted Farrakhan material advancing the antisemitic conspiracy theory that Jews controlled the transatlantic slave trade. That again raises questions about El-Sayed’s judgment.

Former Michigan Democratic Party chairman Lon Johnson has also criticized El-Sayed’s “reluctance to unequivocally condemn dangerous rhetoric” in the context of concerns about antisemitism.

El-Sayed denounces a political system in which “corporations and would-be oligarchs and billionaires” buy politicians. Yet his father-in-law, Tayeb Jukaku, contributed $300,000 to a super PAC supporting him, Jeffrey Soros hosted a fundraiser for him, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez transferred $1 million to a joint fundraising committee supporting his candidacy, according to The New York Times. The contradiction is striking.

Political parties learn from victories. Donors and aspiring candidates study which messages and coalitions succeed. Winning can make an entire campaign seem like a model.

Donald Trump carried Michigan in 2016 and 2024, underscoring its importance as a battleground. An El-Sayed victory could convince future Democrats that the very conduct their party should be rejecting is instead a winning political strategy.

Senate control matters. But a party’s health cannot be measured solely in seats. Its credibility depends on the principles it defends.

Democrats demand that Republicans confront extremism. We must apply the same standard to our own candidates.

Fellow Democrat Haley Stevens has faced fierce backlash from within her own party for endorsing Republican Mike Rogers. Her experience illustrates how quickly party loyalty can become a demand for conformity, even when Democrats believe principle requires a different choice.

I became a Democrat because I believe in tolerance, civil rights and the conviction that prejudice must be confronted rather than excused. Those commitments are precisely why I believe Abdul El-Sayed is entirely unworthy of support within the Democratic Party. And while I have spent my career electing Democrats, in this election, I would cast my vote for Republican Mike Rogers. Not because I have abandoned my party, but because I refuse to abandon the principles that brought me to it.

The Democratic Party cannot claim to stand against extremism while rewarding it at the ballot box. An El-Sayed victory might add a seat to the Democratic column, but it would send a dangerous message about what the party is willing to tolerate in pursuit of power.

Jennifer Bayer Michaels is a Democratic political advisor based in New York.