Michigan Democrat takes heat for Khamenei remark, CA governor race heats up
Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed draws criticism for downplaying the death of Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, sparking debate about progressive political positioning. Noah Rothman analyzes El-Sayed’s strategy and the challenges facing Democrats, then shifts to California’s governor’s race. There is a “15 percent chance of calamity” for Democrats who fear being locked out of the general election by two GOP candidates.
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A Democratic Senate candidate running in the battleground state of Michigan said the United States should try to understand why terrorists commit such “heinous acts,” suggesting those actions stem from a place of “pain and frustration and a level of lack of agency.”
Abdul El-Sayed, a medical doctor and former Wayne County health director, is vying for Michigan’s open Senate seat in the 2026 midterms. He is running on a platform that includes Medicare for All and free education, and has been critical of Israel.
In July 2025, El-Sayed held a town hall in South Haven, Michigan, where a constituent asked how he would address terrorism if elected to the Senate. The exchange was captured on video and first obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.
El-Sayed said that while the United States’ current approach to terror, which leverages U.S. military might against terrorist organizations, is “necessary,” he suggested that leaders must also try to “understand” where terrorists are coming from.
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Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed poses for a portrait in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on Saturday, Feb. 21, 2026. ((Photo by Evan Cobb for The Washington Post via Getty Images))
“I also think we need to be curious about why those things happen in the first place, like, [what] drives somebody to want to commit such a heinous act,” El-Sayed said. “I have to be a student of people’s pain. Like, that’s, that’s what I did in medicine. That’s what I try to do in politics, like, what, what happens when people are in pain?”
El-Sayed said that terrorism is political violence committed in “pursuit of a political end.”
“There is a level of pain and frustration and a level of lack of agency that they have to feel to do something so insane and absurd, right?” El-Sayed said.
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Abdul El Sayed, left, pictured alongside Hasan Piker, right. (Evan Cobb for The Washington Post via Getty Images; Dia Dipasupil/FilmMagic)
He then said that the “heinous acts” of terrorists lead him to reflect on how “we’re behaving that may get somebody to think that we don’t see them.”
“And I think too often, the way we’ve engaged in the world has been that we set up this rules based international order, and then we break the rules of the rules based international order,” El-Sayed said. “And that creates a situation where there are a lot of people who look at us and say, that’s hypocritical, and that’s wrong.”
He said the United States should not respond in ways that don’t “inflame tensions” and that, if elected to the Senate, he would bring “empathy” to U.S. conversations about and responses to terror. He accused Americans of being “high and mighty” in their current views of global conflict.
“I think that for us, there is strength in wisdom and there is strength in empathy, and there is strength in justice, and there’s strength in consistency,” El-Sayed said.
FAR-LEFT SENATE HOPEFUL’S RADICAL TIES TO ‘MADURO CRONIES’ COULD TORPEDO CAMPAIGN: ‘TIRED OF THE CHAOS’
U.S. Senate candidate from Michigan, Abdul El-Sayed, has been endorsed by Bernie Sanders and embraced comparisons between he and Zohran Mamdani. (Bill Pugliano/Getty Images)
El-Sayed, the son of Egyptian immigrants, has been highly critical of Israel’s actions during the Gaza War. He previously accused Israel of committing genocide against Palestinians, and he has campaigned with internet personality Hasan Parker, who has aligned himself with the terrorist group Hamas. Parker said he would vote for Hamas, saying it is a “thousand times better” than Israel and that he would vote for Hamas over Israel “every single time.”
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In the Democratic primary, El-Sayed faces competition from Rep. Hayley Stevens, D-Mich., and Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMarrow.
Fox News Digital reached out to Republican Senate candidate Mike Rogers and El-Sayed for comment.
