What happened
Progressive firebrand Abdul El-Sayed narrowly defeated establishment-backed Rep. Haley Stevens in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary last week, in a race viewed by many political observers as a referendum on the party’s identity. That fight turned out to be much closer than polling suggested. El-Sayed, a former public health official endorsed by independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), used his campaign as a litmus test for Democratic support of Israel, and blasted Stevens for receiving more than $30 million—about half her advertising funding—from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Stevens said El-Sayed, who would become the first Muslim U.S. senator if he wins in November, wants to “blame all of your problems on Jewish Americans.” After his victory was confirmed, El-Sayed called on Michigan Democrats to “mend fences” ahead of his race against the GOP nominee, former Rep. Mike Rogers.
Another Michigan progressive, William Lawrence, won his Democratic primary in a battleground House district following a campaign that focused heavily on opposing data centers. But the party’s leftward momentum stalled in St. Louis, where Missouri Rep. Wesley Bell defeated his challenger, former Rep. Cori Bush, in a House primary. A pro-Israel moderate, Bell unseated Bush in 2024 after she became one of the first sitting lawmakers to call Israel’s war in Gaza a genocide. Following that loss, Bush vowed to run again and warned AIPAC that she would “tear your kingdom down.” Bell won this week by more than 20 points.
What the columnists said
El-Sayed’s win was not the “resounding verdict in the Democratic civil war” he had anticipated, said Adam Wren in Politico. He was confident throughout the race, bragging about feeling no stress as voting began. Can you blame him? Some polls gave him a double-digit lead. But in the end, Stevens lost by only a point, thanks to strong support from Black and lower-income voters. Still, it was “an impressive effort” from the grassroots El-Sayed, who was outspent by Stevens by almost $60 million.
Are Democrats “playing for fun” or “playing to win”? asked Kevin D. Williamson in The Dispatch. Defeating Rogers, the GOP’s “bland Trump factotum,” in November ought to have been “pretty easy.” But it won’t be after Democrats nominated El-Sayed, a “left-wing goofball” who fixates on Jews, parties with podcaster and “Hamas apologist” Hasan Piker, and “advocates a state-monopoly health-care system that would strip Michigan union members of cherished benefits.” In a must-win battleground state, polls show he’s trailing Rogers, 46% to 43%.
Stevens may have been a safer bet, said William Kristol in The Bulwark. But once the bitterness of the primary subsides, the “national environment will still help the Democratic nominee.” It’s Rogers, not El-Sayed, who’s tainted by the historically unpopular President Trump. If El-Sayed leaves his squabbles with fellow Democrats for another day and sticks to “the fundamentals” of fighting Trump, he can help them flip the Senate.