The fragile unity of Michigan’s Democratic Party is under severe strain in the closing days of the midterm campaign, with Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign asking former primary opponent Rep. Haley Stevens to skip remaining campaign events. A planned Sunday unity event in Detroit at a church, featuring prominent Black leader and South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, is now expected to proceed without Stevens. The development marks a deepening rift following a contentious August primary in which El-Sayed narrowly defeated Stevens by less than a percentage point after weathering heavy outside spending from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee.
Tensions boiled over when Stevens publicly pressured El-Sayed to denounce an outside political advertisement from Rebellion PAC, founded by leftist commentator Cenk Uygur, which attributes Americans’ economic hardships to U.S. foreign aid for Israel. El-Sayed dismissed the pressure on Friday night, stating that Stevens appeared intent on relitigating a primary that concluded three months ago. He emphasized that his campaign remains anchored on pressing kitchen-table issues such as gas prices, grocery costs, and healthcare access, alongside the overarching goal of defeating Republican opponent Mike Rogers and reclaiming the Senate majority.
Meanwhile, Rogers has actively courted voters who backed Stevens, particularly within Jewish and Black communities. Rogers blasted El-Sayed on social media, characterizing his campaign as rooted in bigotry and inviting disenfranchised Stevens supporters to join his camp. El-Sayed also faced pressure after condemning controversial remarks by progressive streamer Hasan Piker, who compared door-knocking by El-Sayed’s campaign in West Bloomfield—a heavily Jewish suburb home to a synagogue targeted in March—to campaigning in a Ku Klux Klan neighborhood. El-Sayed, a vocal critic of Israel’s military actions in Gaza and U.S. foreign funding, has sought to solidify support across diverse constituencies, including Arab American voters in Dearborn, where some residents voiced shifting political allegiances.
State Sen. Mallory McMorrow, who dropped out of the primary weeks before the election, sharply criticized Stevens on Friday for disrupting Democratic chances against Rogers in a state that has not elected a Republican senator in three decades. As legal battles and high-stakes campaigning unfold nationwide ahead of Tuesday’s election, the friction in Michigan highlights the delicate coalition-building challenges facing Democrats in battleground races.
