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‘We took on the machine’: El-Sayed celebrates triumph over outside spending after clinching Democratic nomination in bitter Michigan Senate primary
Joseph Gedeon
“They spent an unprecedented amount of money to beat us” Abdul El-Sayed said, after officially winning the Michigan’s Democratic nomination for US Senate.
El-Sayed remarked on the millions in outside spending while holding his first press conference in downtown Detroit as the newly minted nominee. “But it turns out the commercials are the part of the television show most people don’t want to watch,” he added.
“We took on a machine. You’re not supposed to be able to beat $70m dollars of outside spending – a record amount of money spent in a campaign against a Democrat in a primary in any campaign,” he said. “You’re not supposed to be able to beat that. And what we showed is that the power of our many is greater than the power of their money.”
Key events
Senate confirms Erica Schwartz to lead CDC after almost a year without a permanent director
By a vote of 51-44, mainly along party lines, the Senate confirmed Erica Schwartz to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), after the agency has been without a permanent director for almost a year.
Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia was the only Democrat to join all Republicans and vote yes on Schwartz’s nomination.
Bernie Sanders congratulates El-Sayed on primary win and taking on ‘the entire billionaire class’
Bernie Sanders, the independent senator from Vermont, congratulated the progressive Democrats he endorsed, who won in Michigan’s closely watched primary elections –including the Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed.
“Congratulations to Will Lawrence, Donavan McKinney and Dr Abdul El-Sayed on their historic victories last night,” Sanders said.
The senator highlighted El-Sayed’s victory, commenting on his success despite the funding disparities between El-Sayed and his rival, Haley Stevens.
“Abdul took on the entire billionaire class, faced more than $60 million in spending against him, and WON,” Sanders added in his statement on social media.
Todd Blanche rides the fence in Pirro-Trump reflecting pool battle
During a press conference at the Department of Justice earlier today, the acting US attorney general, Todd Blanche, avoided siding with Donald Trump or the US attorney for the District of Columbia, Jeanine Pirro, over her decision to dismiss vandalism charges at the reflecting pool against Olympic canoeist David Hearn.
Blanche said that he did not want the “message” to be that “because Trump expressed appropriate frustration at the damage done to the reflecting pool” that Pirro is not “working every day to combat violent crime and to make the city safe”.
These comments come as Blanche awaits the final vote in the Senate for his confirmation as attorney general. Two key Republican holdouts, senators John Cornyn and Thom Tillis, said they would now vote for Blanche’s nomination after he said in writing that a planned $1.8bn slush fund for Trump’s allies was dead. However, Susan Collins, a moderate Republican senator from Maine, said she would note vote to confirm Blanche – citing the creation of the so-called “anti-weaponization fund” as part of her reasoning.
Blanche is hoping to gain the votes of two other GOP lawmakers in order to shore up his position – Lisa Murkowski and Bill Cassidy.
Cassidy, the outgoing senator from Louisiana who lost his primary earlier this year to a Trump-backed challenger, said in a radio interview on Wednesday that he had still not made his decision. “I’ve got to be convinced that he is an attorney general who just happens to have once been President Trump’s personal attorney, as opposed to President Trump’s personal attorney who is now the attorney general,” Cassidy said. “I think there’s a big difference between the two.”
A quick note that we can expect a vote today on Erica Schwartz’s nomination to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). This would mean that the beleaguered public health agency finally has a permanent director in almost a year, since the last Senate-confirmed leader – Susan Monarez – was ousted by Robert F Kennedy Jr last August, after they clashed over the health secretary’s vaccine policy.
Schwartz received a majority of the votes to advance her nomination out of the Senate health committee, and is expected to be confirmed along party lines. During her confirmation hearing Schwartz, who previously served as deputy surgeon general in Donald Trump’s first administration, was questioned about how she would handle Kennedy’s vaccine skepticism as a longstanding supporter of childhood inoculations.
David Smith
A former megachurch pastor who endured 15 years of conversion practices is set to become the first transgender member of Michigan’s state legislature after winning a Democratic primary election on Tuesday.
Joanna Whaley comfortably defeated Frank Liberati, a former state representative, and Gary Schlack in the primary for the second district of the Michigan statehouse, a Democratic stronghold.
Earlier this year Liberati sought to have Whaley disqualified from the ballot over her name change, but the Wayne county clerk’s office dismissed the challenge, finding that Whaley’s candidate affidavit was legal and proper.
Whaley, 38, who grew up in a Catholic family, previously spent two decades working as a pastor at an evangelical megachurch.
Sarah McBride, the first openly transgender member of the US Congress, posted on X on Wednesday: “So proud of my friend, Joanna Whaley! She faced indignities from her opponent, channeled the energy into knocking on doors, doubled down on her economic agenda, and she defeated that former Dem legislator (who took the low road against her) by 30+%! Way to go, Joanna!”
Whaley, 38, who grew up in a Catholic family, previously spent two decades working as a pastor at an evangelical megachurch.
Meanwhile, Democrats are reacting more positively. California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, congratulated El-Sayed on his “hard-fought victory” on social media.
“Trump and the GOP are trying everything to rig the rules and silence voters – but they can’t stop a Democratic Party united around working people and accountability,” the Democrat governor wrote. “On to November! Let’s take our country back.”
The Republican backlash to El-Sayed’s victory continues, with the Arkansas senator Tom Cotton writing on X that “the Democratic party has lost its mind”.
In a separate post, he lashed out at the Democratic senator Chris Murphy for expressing his enthusiasm for El-Sayed’s triumph, writing: “Senate Democrats are ‘excited’ for Abdul El-Sayed who proudly campaigns with extremists who say America deserved 9/11 [referring to 2019 comments from leftwing influencer Hasan Piker]. The Islamic-Marxists truly are taking over the Democratic party. We must never give them power.”
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac), which spent roughly $30m in a failed effort to defeat El-Sayed in the Democratic primary, says it’s committed to opposing him in the general election, signaling plans to spend for Republican Mike Rogers.
“Our members remain determined to ensure that voters reject Dr El-Sayed and his radical anti-Israel agenda in November,” the group’s statement said.
“While disappointed that some of our Aipac-backed candidates did not prevail, our community is proud to support pro-Israel Democrats and Republicans who stand for our values, and we are encouraged that voters in races across this primary season continue to broadly choose leaders who support a strong US-Israel partnership,” it added.
Aipac’s brand has struggled as of late to capture new voters, with El-Sayed’s victory underscoring the continued momentum of progressive candidates. But the funding power and influence of the lobbying group still remains, with some Aipac-supported candidates triumphing on Tuesday.
Mike Rogers urges voters to make the choice between ‘common sense and complete insanity’ after El-Sayed’s primary win
Michigan GOP Senate nominee Mike Rogers released a statement urging general election voters to make the “simple” choice between “common sense and complete insanity”, following Abdul El-Sayed’s narrow primary win for the Michigan US Senate seat.
“This election isn’t just about choosing a Senator. It’s about deciding whether Michigan has a future built on common sense – or whether we hand the keys to the most fringe extremists in the nation,” said Rogers, who ran unopposed on Tuesday, and is gunning for the open seat after narrowly losing the 2024 Senate race to Elissa Slotkin.
Insurgent Democrat ousts incumbent in Michigan House primary
In Michigan’s 13th congressional district – which includes parts of Detroit – Donavan McKinney beat incumbent Shri Thanedar in a closely watched Democratic primary that mirrored many of identity battles facing the party this midterm cycle.
McKinney, 34, a state lawmaker who received the backing of many progressives in Congress, including the Michigan representative Rashida Tlaib and the independent senator Bernie Sanders, won his race by almost four points, and successfully ousted the two-term Thanedar, 71, who was endorsed by the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries.
While some of Thanedar and McKinney’s platform policies overlap, Thanedar’s win in 2022 marked the first time the majority-Black Detroit area has not had a Black representative in Congress in years.
McKinney, who was recruited by Justice Democrats – a progressive Pac – was also endorsed by some House Congressional Black caucus members, despite party leadership backing Thanedar.
The new nominee was also outspoken about the war in Gaza – calling it a “genocide” while campaigning to end military aid to Israel. McKinney also campaigned alongside Abdul El-Sayed, who went on to win the Democratic nomination for Michigan’s open US Senate seat.
‘We took on the machine’: El-Sayed celebrates triumph over outside spending after clinching Democratic nomination in bitter Michigan Senate primary
Joseph Gedeon
“They spent an unprecedented amount of money to beat us” Abdul El-Sayed said, after officially winning the Michigan’s Democratic nomination for US Senate.
El-Sayed remarked on the millions in outside spending while holding his first press conference in downtown Detroit as the newly minted nominee. “But it turns out the commercials are the part of the television show most people don’t want to watch,” he added.
“We took on a machine. You’re not supposed to be able to beat $70m dollars of outside spending – a record amount of money spent in a campaign against a Democrat in a primary in any campaign,” he said. “You’re not supposed to be able to beat that. And what we showed is that the power of our many is greater than the power of their money.”
Ahead of the Associated Press calling the Michigan Democratic primary for US Senate, various conservative groups got to work blasting Abdul El-Sayed as the likely nominee.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) released a video on Wednesday, decidedly referring to the candidate by his full name, Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed, and branding him as “the most radical Senate candidate in America” and “wrong for Michigan” – while highlighting comments from leftwing influencer Hasan Piker that “America deserved 9/11” during a stream in 2019. Piker has campaigned alongside El-Sayed, and routinely apologized for his past remarks.
Democrats rally around El-Sayed ahead of crucial November election
State and national Democrats have begun to coalesce around Abdul El-Sayed after he narrowly won the primary for the Michigan US Senate seat.
One of Michigan’s Democratic senators, Elissa Slotkin, congratulated El-Sayed and said there is “nothing more important” than “uniting, keeping this seat blue, flipping the House and Senate, and providing a real check” on Donald Trump.
Others in the party have also urged the fractured coalition to work together in the short runway until November to retain a vital seat for Democrats to have any chance at reclaiming the majority in the upper chamber.
“I urge folks to come together – the stakes are high, and we need Abdul in the Senate to stand up for all Michiganders and the country we love,” said Senator Chris Van Hollen, a Democrat from Marlyand.
Meanwhile, Mallory McMorrow, who also ran in the Michigan Senate Democratic primary before suspending her campaign in July, said that El-Sayed has her “full endorsement and support”.
McMorrow’s name still appeared on Tuesday’s ballot, and she wracked up more than 60,000 votes – all of which El-Sayed hopes to absorb in November.
“This was a brutal primary,” McMorrow said. “Trump and Mike Rogers are counting on us staying divided. Let’s prove them wrong by beating Mike Rogers and taking our country back.”
Trump calls El-Sayed primary win ‘great news’ for GOP
In Las Vegas, Donald Trump has weighed in on the results from the Democratic primary for Michigan’s US Senate seat.
After Abdul El-Sayed won the party’s nomination, the president called it “great news” for Republicans in a post on Truth Social.
Trump went on to call El-Sayed a “communist loser who hates Jews and Israel”, despite the Democratic nominee’s frequent denunciations of antisemitism.
The president also noted that Stevens “was not expected to do nearly as well as she did”.
“Now, the Dumocrats crazy policies will only get worse!” Trump wrote.
Campaign arm for Senate Democrats backs El-Sayed following primary victory
The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC) has said it now looks forward to working with Abdul El-Sayed in the wake of his primary victory in Michigan.
The main campaign arm for Senate Democrats had backed Haley Stevens in the bitter race for the nomination, but praised El-Sayed for his “energetic campaign that inspired thousands of Michiganders across the state”.
In a statement Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader, and Kristen Gillibrand, chair of the DSCC, said that Democrats are united by a “common purpose” in this midterms cycle, “putting a check on Donald Trump by defeating his Republican enablers and taking back the Senate”.
They called Mike Rogers, the Republican nominee who ran unopposed in his primary, “a rubber stamp” from the president, and accused him of backing the same “reckless agenda that has driven up costs for working families”. Rogers lost his bid for Senate to Democrat Elissa Slotkin in 2024 by fewer than 20,000 votes.
Haley Stevens concedes in acrimonious primary battle, offers ‘full support’ to El-Sayed in November
Haley Stevens has conceded in the hotly contested Democratic Senate primary in Michigan. The Asssociated Press called the race a short while ago.
“I love Michigan and am so proud to have put up my hand to serve. I spoke with Abdul a few moments ago to offer him my full support as we work to defeat Mike Rogers this November,” she said on social media.
Stevens’ saw a deluge of outside spending to boost her campaign, including more than $30m from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac), a pro-Israel lobby group.
Abdul El-Sayed clinches Democratic nomination in bitter fight for Michigan US Senate seat
Abdul El-Sayed has won the Democratic nomination in the US Senate seat in Michigan, beating Haley Stevens in a bitter competition that became a referendum on the changing face of the Democratic party.
El-Sayed won the race by a single point, fewer than 15,000 votes, according to the Associated Press. He will now face Republican nominee Mike Rogers – who ran unopposed – for a key battleground seat that is vital for Democrats to retain in order to achieve their lofty goal of reclaiming the majority in the upper chamber of Congress.
The Democratic primary became a proxy battle between the establishment and progressive wings of the party, with El-Sayed, an epidemiologist and former state public health official, receiving the backing of many leaders on the left flank. Meanwhile Stevens, a serving US congresswoman who flipped her district blue in 2018, received support from party leaders – including the Michigan governor, Gretchen Whitmer – and was supported by tens of millions of dollars in outside Pac funding from the pro-Israel lobby. The latter was a point on which El-Sayed hammered on the campaign trail in Michigan, the birthplace of the uncommitted movement – which saw a sizeable portion of Arab-American voters eschew Kamala Harris in 2024 over the Biden administration’s stance on the Israel-Gaza war.
“This was always going to be the many versus the money, and tonight, we have shown that Michiganders want money out of politics, money in their pockets, and Medicare for all. We are building a coalition that is fired up and ready to go beat Mike Rogers,” said El-Sayed’s campaign manager, Alia Kapasi, in a statement.
Wayne county – Michigan’s largest – is the area of the state we’re still waiting on before the Associated Press calls the race. As of now, 88% of votes in the county have been counted.
