Michigan Senate Race Ends With Dispute Over Abdul El-Sayed Attacks and Rhetoric

Michigan voters were set to decide the U.S. Senate race on Tuesday between Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed and Republican Mike Rogers, a contest in which El-Sayed would become the first Muslim in the U.S. Senate if he won. In the final days, the campaign was dominated by attacks over El-Sayed's religion, ethnicity and alleged ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. President Donald Trump called him a "jihadist," and Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made remarks about Arabs that critics called racist. Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, who dropped out of the Democratic primary before August, said a mailer put El-Sayed's face beside the World Trade Center's Twin Towers and called the campaign the most bigoted she had seen. Rep. Haley Stevens, the primary runner-up, portrayed El-Sayed as antisemitic, citing a PAC ad, and on Sunday endorsed Rogers. Rogers has tried to link El-Sayed to the Muslim Brotherhood and portray him as anti-American, and says the attacks are not about faith.

The right-leaning coverage, from The Blaze and National Review, centers on El-Sayed's politics and his supporters. National Review's headline compares him to Gerry Adams and says his denials of Muslim Brotherhood ties follow a familiar playbook. The Blaze focuses on a former New York Times op-ed contributor who is being mocked for warning of a "reckoning" whether El-Sayed wins or loses, and it describes El-Sayed's possible win as a milestone. Neither excerpt mentions the Islamophobia charges. The alternative outlets Zeteo and The Intercept take a distinct angle: they treat the Islamophobic attacks as the defining feature of the race and quote McMorrow, while noting Stevens's antisemitism claims have recently overshadowed them. They also say Muslim Republicans were disgusted by the rhetoric. Both sides agree on the Muslim Brotherhood allegation as a central line of attack, but they disagree on whether it is legitimate scrutiny or bigotry. Left-leaning outlets had not reported this story at the time of writing, while right-leaning and alternative outlets had.