El-Sayed Wins Michigan and Taunts AIPAC. Here’s the Record Israel’s Friends Should Watch

Written By TNT Staff, Posted on November 4, 2026

Abdul El-Sayed will be the first Muslim to serve in the U.S. Senate. The Associated Press called Michigan’s open-seat race for the Democrat at 2:27 a.m. Wednesday. With 96% of the expected vote counted, he led Republican Mike Rogers 52.4% to 45.6%, a margin of about 325,600 votes. The seat belonged to retiring Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, so it stays with Democrats. No Muslim has served in the Senate before, though Muslims have served in the House since Keith Ellison’s election in 2006.

That is a real milestone, and the Constitution says there’s no religious test for office. His faith isn’t the issue. His record on Israel is, and so is how he chose to start his victory.

“Beat you twice”

In Detroit, El-Sayed opened with his full name, Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed, and then turned on the pro-Israel lobby. “To AIPAC, who spent 42 million to beat us, thank you for the opportunity to beat you twice,” he said, according to JFeed and other reports of the speech. He added, “We don’t want our money sent to do apartheid, or genocide, or war,” according to i24NEWS and The Times of Israel, matching a video clip of the speech posted on X.

The $42 million figure is his claim. Federal Election Commission filings compiled by tracking sites show AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project, reported about $20.1 million against him, most of it before his narrow Aug. 4 primary win, plus about $10.5 million backing primary rival Haley Stevens. NBC News, citing AdImpact, put UDP’s primary ad spending at about $33 million. TNT could not find a source for $42 million.

TNT graphic. Sources: Associated Press; FEC independent-expenditure filings.

What he has said about Israel

His positions are on the record. Asked on CNN in April whether Israel’s government is “just as evil as Hamas,” he answered, “Yes.” He has called Israel’s conduct in Gaza a genocide and said he would end unconditional military aid, including defensive aid such as Iron Dome, according to The Forward. “Our money should be spent here, rather than sent in the form of bombs or tanks to foreign governments, particularly when they’re doing the most heinous things with them, as is the case with the government of Israel,” he said, per Mediaite. He says the same standard applies to Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Qatar.

Supporters of the U.S.-Israel alliance should take him at his word. A senator can vote on aid packages, arms sales and resolutions. Michigan just sent one who wants to cut Israel off.

TNT graphic. Sources: CNN transcript; AP; Fox News; El-Sayed campaign video; i24NEWS; Times of Israel.

The organizing question

His backers include Sen. Bernie Sanders, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the UAW and Emgage Action, a Muslim voter-mobilization group, the Michigan Advance reported. Critics, including a Center for Security Policy analyst at a Senate hearing in August, have tied him to groups they call Brotherhood-linked. Fox News reported that he took more than $115,000 from people tied to the Council on American-Islamic Relations, including his father-in-law. TNT has not checked those donations.

What the public record shows is narrower. In a 2007 filing in the Holy Land Foundation terror-financing case, federal prosecutors listed CAIR and the Islamic Society of North America among unindicted co-conspirators. Neither was charged, both reject any terror ties, and courts later ruled that publicly naming them violated their due-process rights, as the Fifth Circuit noted. On Jan. 13, Treasury designated the Egyptian and Jordanian Muslim Brotherhoods as terrorists for material support to Hamas. El-Sayed has said “I’ve disavowed them,” and nothing public shows he has belonged to the group. As TNT reported in October, he has not endorsed those designations by name.

His win will be studied as a model: a disciplined Muslim and progressive turnout operation that beat the pro-Israel lobby in a primary and then won statewide. Pro-Israel voters can’t answer that with smears. They answer it by organizing, and by holding Senator El-Sayed to his votes.

Prior TNT coverage: El-Sayed drops Haley Stevens from Detroit rally over egg ad.

TNT Staff