On Sunday, Democratic Congresswoman Haley Stevens came out in support of Republican Mike Rogers in the Michigan Senate election. This came just two days before the mid-term elections.
In doing so, she turned her back on her own party’s candidate, the Muslim Abdul El-Sayed, following a long-running dispute over an advert that blamed Israel for high food prices in the US.
Stevens appeared alongside Rogers at the Perfecting Church in Detroit on Sunday morning, reports Townhall.
– “Abdul made it very clear that I wasn’t welcome in his campaign, that he didn’t need me there and didn’t want me there. And at some point, you have to look at who is standing up for the country,” she said afterwards in a post on X.
Stevens narrowly lost to El-Sayed in the Democrats’ primary in August, but nevertheless promised to support him. However, that only lasted until the advert from Rebellion PAC appeared just over a week ago.
Rebellion PAC is a radical left-wing group founded by Cenk Uygur of the online channel The Young Turks. In the advert, a couple are shopping for food for their children. The wife says they have to put the eggs back because they need to set aside seven dollars to ‘kill Palestinians’. The husband replies that the US, after all, gives Israel four billion dollars a year.
The Jewish organisation ADL described it as desperate to blame the Jewish state for the price of bananas.
However, El-Sayed’s campaign refused to condemn the content. Stevens had in fact demanded that he do so. She also wanted him to remove one of his own adverts, in which he used Tucker Carlson’s criticism of Rogers.
Instead, on Friday evening, Stevens received a message from El-Sayed’s campaign stating that she was not welcome at his events. That same evening, Rogers rang her.
Her fiancé, Jason Turkish, had already said the week before that he would vote for Rogers.
Mike Rogers chaired the House Intelligence Committee and narrowly lost the 2024 Senate election in Michigan. The seat is now vacant following the resignation of Democrat Gary Peters, and the election is regarded as one of those that could determine the majority in the Senate.
The Democratic leader in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, called the decision a despicable betrayal. According to CBS, Stevens’ own staff also resigned in protest. The party’s Michigan chairman, Curtis Hertel, went further. He stated that Stevens is no longer a member, and that she will not be reinstated. Her name and photograph have been removed from the party’s website, and she has lost access to the electoral register. Stevens herself says she is not turning her back on the Democrats.
President Donald Trump, on the other hand, described her as a highly respected Democrat and has invited her to join the Republican Party.
If El-Sayed is elected, he will become the first Muslim in the Senate. He has faced considerable criticism after the Washington Free Beacon uncovered a post by his half-sister regarding the family’s links to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.
El-Sayed denies that he or his family have such links.
The election will be held on Tuesday.
