‘We cannot afford Abdul’: Rogers, El-Sayed face off in contentious Michigan Senate debate 

Republican Mike Rogers and his Democratic opponent, Abdul El-Sayed, clashed over everything from the economy to El-Sayed’s mother in a Michigan Senate debate Thursday that grew increasingly combative.

Hosted by NewsNation, the debate was the first of two in the nationally watched Senate race between El-Sayed, a progressive and former health official, and the Trump-endorsed Rogers, a former congressman. El-Sayed leads by four percentage points in an average of the five most recent polls gathered by 270toWin.

Iran and Israel take center stage

The Middle East looms large in Michigan, home to one of the country’s biggest Muslim and Arab American communities. El-Sayed, a Muslim, has made opposing the war in Iran a key part of his campaign.

Rogers linked El-Sayed to Islamic extremism, criticizing him for refusing to condemn the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

“This is the same IRGC that has killed American troops in Iraq. It has blood on their hands, tried a terrorist attack here in the United States,” Rogers said. “If you can’t condemn the IRGC, you have no business in the United States Senate.”

Rogers also attacked El-Sayed’s funding sources. “He gets money from people who openly support Hamas, Hezbollah, Al Qaeda,” he said.

El-Sayed painted Rogers as a warmonger who was controlled by corporations and foreign interests rather than Michigan voters.

“We are fighting this stupid war because people like him have been pushing for it for 20 years. When you’ve got an international problem, he’s got a war for that,” he said. “Every single situation: Iraq, Iran, and what other wars is he going to cheerlead?”

El-Sayed implied that if Israel were attacked, he would not vote to send defensive weapons, saying he does “not want our tax dollars buying weapons for other countries.”

“I’ve been absolutely clear. I want our tax dollars spent here to provide schools here,” he said, adding that Israel pushed the U.S. to go to war in Iran and branding Rogers as a cheerleader for the effort. “Ask yourself: Are we safer because of that war? He wants unconditional support for a foreign government. I want unconditional support for kids in our schools, unconditional support for our healthcare, childcare–things that he would vote to defund.”

Asked if Iran or Israel was a bigger threat, El-Sayed did not directly answer, calling the question a “ridiculous hypothetical” and labeling both countries as dangerous.

“I think both of them have proven dangerous in their own way,” El-Sayed said. “One at risk of attacking us. One getting us into wars we have no business fighting.”

Attacks turn personal

The candidates exchanged increasingly personal barbs throughout the debate. Rogers likened El-Sayed to an AI chatbot that’s a little glitchy, accusing him of recycling talking points, and said his policies would lead to an economic disaster.

“We cannot afford Abdul,” Rogers said, claiming his platform would raise gas and utility prices and that his Medicare for All plan would take away private health insurance.

El-Sayed said Rogers was deflecting on issues to make the race about “him and about me” instead of about the voters.

At one point, Rogers suggested El-Sayed’s opposition to Flock cameras could be because “you have someone in your family that might be on the watchlist.”

“You’re going after my mom?” El-Sayed asked.

“I’m not going after your mom, what your mom was working at, I was going after that organization that was indicted for funneling money to Al Qaeda. Look, that’s your mom. My mom worked at the local Chamber of Commerce.”

Republicans press on El-Sayed’s ‘radical’ platform

Republican groups told Heartlander News El-Sayed is “too radical for Michigan.”

“Abdul El-Sayed is a radical socialist leading the pro-Hamas wing of his party and refusing to denounce his best buddy Hasan Piker for saying ‘America deserved 9/11,’” National Republican Senatorial Committee regional press secretary Samantha Cantrell told Heartlander News, adding that he will “lose to Mike Rogers in November.”

Sam Markstein, a spokesman for the Republican Jewish Coalition, told Heartlander News that “no amount of debate-stage spin will erase Abdul El-Sayed’s abysmal record.”

The record includes “making excuses for the Hezbollah-inspired terrorist that attacked Temple Israel in West Bloomfield with ‘hurt people hurt people’, libelously smearing Israel as ‘bloodthirsty’ and ‘just as evil’ as Hamas, campaigning with notorious bigot Hasan Piker who said ‘America deserved 9/11’, and just this week, on the third anniversary of Oct. 7, El-Sayed didn’t say one word about the monstrous massacre of innocents in Israel, including 46 Americans.”

Markstein said Michigan deserves a senator who stands with its Jewish residents, adding that Rogers “will stand with us.”

Heartlander News reached out to the Jewish Democratic Council of America for comment on the debate and race but did not hear back by publication time. The El-Sayed and Rogers campaigns did not respond to requests for comment.

Following the debate, President Donald Trump said Rogers “completely obliterated” El-Sayed, calling the latter a “jihadist lunatic who hates our country, the black people of Detroit, and wants to see the U.S. fail.”

(Image credit: Screenshot/WoodTV8)