▶ Watch Video: How the Michigan Senate primary is reflecting Democrats’ national divide
Southfield, Michigan – Michigan Democratic Senate candidates Abdul El-Sayed and Rep. Haley Stevens clashed on issues of spending by outside groups, the tone of the race and electability in the last televised debate before a pivotal primary election next Tuesday.
The Democratic primary contest to fill the open seat of outgoing Democratic Sen. Gary Peters has turned into a proxy for a larger intra-party debate over whether candidates with progressive policy stances on Medicare for All and abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement — as well as aggressive criticism of U.S. financial support for Israel — are the best options to run in competitive races this November.
Stevens, who has represented parts of the Detroit area in the House since 2019, is part of the party’s moderate wing. El-Sayed, a doctor by training who has held top health positions in Detroit and Wayne County, Michigan, is a progressive.
On outside funding
El-Sayed has hammered Stevens for the wave of outside funding that has backed her campaign, especially the tens of millions of dollars from groups affiliated with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, or AIPAC.
On Monday, El-Sayed cited her July vote against an amendment that would cut $3.3 billion in annual military aid to Israel. El-Sayed called military assistance to Israel the “worst use of our tax dollars.”
Stevens denied that the influx of outside spending would influence her views on Israel as a senator. She said she supports a two-state solution to the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians, and highlighted her recent criticism of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, drawing pushback from Netanyahu in a CNN interview.
Stevens also responded by pointing to a super PAC supporting El-Sayed, the “Fighting for Michigan PAC,” that has received $300,000 from his father-in-law, Jukaku Tayeb.
“I don’t think there’s much difference between super PACs going in for Abdul or super PACs going in for me. We have a problem with campaign finance reform in this country,” Stevens said.
The Fighting for Michigan group has spent over $2.3 million to support El-Sayed.
By comparison, AIPAC’s super PAC, the United Democracy Project, has spent over $19.9 million to support Stevens through July 20, according to campaign finance records. Another group, “A Stronger Michigan,” has spent $16.8 million to support Stevens but has not disclosed who its donors are.
“My father-in-law does not want to send your tax dollars to the Israeli military to do genocide, I’ll tell you that much,” he told reporters after the debate. El-Sayed has frequently accused Israel of committing genocide in the Gaza Strip, a charge Israel denies.
Stevens’ campaign and six super PACs that back her have spent over $61 million on ads during the primary, according to advertisement tracking firm AdImpact. El-Sayed’s campaign and outside groups combined have spent over $15.3 million, according to FEC reports.
On electability
The winner of the Aug. 4 Democratic primary will likely face Republican former Rep. Mike Rogers in November, who spent Monday at President Trump’s side during his remarks at a General Motors plant in Milford, Michigan.
“The president is doing his part. You look around the country. They’re scoring some big wins in manufacturing … We got to send President Trump some help,” Rogers said on stage with the president, who won Michigan in 2024 by 1.4 points.
A Republican hasn’t represented Michigan in the Senate for 25 years. But as the national Democratic Party debates whether the success of insurgent progressive and democratic socialist candidates in New York City and elsewhere represents a winning strategy for the whole country, Stevens and her allies argue that El-Sayed poses a political risk.
El-Sayed does not identify himself as a socialist.
“I’m just a capitalist who understands how capitalism works,” El-Sayed said Monday night. “The biggest threat to capitalism was never the idea of government regulation. It was always monopol[ies].”
El-Sayed has been endorsed by progressive figures like independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. Stevens is backed by members of the party’s moderate flank, like Peters and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
Stevens argued one of the things progressive politicians who support El-Sayed are “missing” is “an understanding of what makes our state tick.”
“We don’t need a celebrity candidate. We don’t need a celebrity senator. We need somebody who is committed to six years of hard, unglamorous work that’s going to stand up to this junk that is wreaking havoc and causing chaos right before our very eyes,” Stevens said.
Rogers told CBS News on Monday he has no preference on which candidate he’d prefer to face in November.
“They talk the same way, and they vote the same way,” he said. “The crazy train has arrived. It’s going to be either crazy, or common sense.”
“Ogre on a Pike”
El-Sayed was asked about recent Politico reporting on him using controversial rhetoric to describe the stakes of his victory in a recent donor meeting.
In an audio recording of the meeting, El-Sayed said that should he win the primary, it would give the progressive movement an opportunity to oust incumbents like Democratic Sen. John Fetterman. “Ideally you put one ogre on a pike, and then everyone else gets the message, and all of a sudden starts to sound a lot different,” El-Sayed said.
When asked about the overall tone and tenor of his campaign, and if he regrets these kinds of comments, El-Sayed said that he’s publicly told his supporters not to target Stevens’ character or personality.
“I don’t know what else you would want from a candidate. I’ve literally said, ‘Do not make fun of her. It’s unkind,'” El-Sayed told reporters after the debate. He then said the tone of the race has been primarily set by ads put out by super PACs supporting Stevens that attack his character.
El-Sayed also responded to recent accusations — leveled by a pro-Stevens group — that he “has a history of disrespecting women.” A recent ad funded by United Democracy Project features past comments El-Sayed has made about Whitmer and former first lady Michelle Obama.
The ad cites a 2010 op-ed in which El-Sayed describes Obama’s efforts to combat childhood obesity as “uninspired” and “commendable, if ineffectual.” It also references a comment El-Sayed made during his 2018 gubernatorial primary campaign calling Whitmer “bought and sold.”
“My mother was the first tenured professor of engineering at her university. I was raised by strong women. To say that somehow, because I wrote an op-ed 15 years ago about what first lady Michelle Obama said, or I ran against Governor Whitmer, that somehow I’m disrespecting anybody, is just inconsistent with the truth,” El-Sayed said during the debate.
Stevens, however, doubled down, and pointed to comments critical of women candidates or politicians in Michigan.
“That is certainly on him to respond to,” Stevens said.
Financial Disclosures
El-Sayed released his latest personal financial disclosure report Monday, which showed two rental properties, one in Bangalore, India, and the other in Dubai, United Arab Emirates — each valued at between $100,001 and $250,000. The properties are listed as being owned by El-Sayed’s spouse, board-certified psychiatrist Sarah Jukaku.
Stevens alleged that El-Sayed is not being transparent with his finances and insinuated that he has $300,000 in payments listed as “other” business income in his financial disclosure.
“You have not released your full tax returns, $300,000 in other income, while you sat in the podcast chair and you hawked junk healthcare cures that RFK Jr. would thumbs up,” Stevens said of El-Sayed, who hosted a health-focused podcast for years. “You talk about getting money out of politics and putting money in people’s pockets, but still no one knows who’s putting the money in your pocket.”
El-Sayed attempted to brush off Stevens’ comment, saying that he has released his financial disclosures and that it is a “distraction from the issues in your life.”
“People are going to pay attention to properties that literally my wife’s family inherited, and then put in their kid’s names and then sold. And I wonder why they’re so focused on foreign properties with a name like mine. Do you think it might fit within a well-worn trope?” El-Sayed told reporters after the debate.