El-Sayed, Stevens Vote for Democratic Senate Nomination in Michigan Is Too Close To Call

Dr. Abdul El-Sayed and Congresswoman Haley Stevens are in a near-tie for the race to be the Democratic nominee in this year’s U.S. Senate race in Michigan after polls closed on Tuesday night. Both candidates say they are waiting for additional results to come in before commenting further on the race. As of 6:49 A.M., with 95 percent of the ballots counted, Dr. El-Sayed was in the lead with 48.6 percent of the vote, the Associated Press reports. Ms. Stevens, with 47.4 percent of the vote, trailed by less than 20,000 votes. A Michigan state senator, Mallory McMorrow, who had dropped out of the race, garnered 4 percent of the votes. NBC News, ahead of other news organizations, this morning called the race and projected that Dr. El-Sayed would emerge the winner.At their respective election night parties, both candidates said they would wait for additional results to come in before they pontificate on the race. The Michigan Senate race has become a bellwether for the future of the Democratic Party, as Ms. Stevens — backed by the party’s establishment and tens of millions of dollars in outside spending — and Dr. El-Sayed — supported by progressives from across the country — battle to be a standard-bearer in a must-win Senate race this year. If Democrats lose the Michigan race in November, there is virtually no path for the party to retake Senate control come next year. “I am feeling good about this race. I am feeling fired up, and you should be, too,” Ms. Stevens said with a smile early Wednesday morning. “We are not gonna know the results for just a little while.”Dr. El-Sayed, at his election night party, praised his supporters for turning out the vote despite the tens of millions of dollars that were spent against him by outside groups in the primary this year. “We are on track to vastly out-vote the historical numbers that we should have expected, and that tells you about the kind of movement that we were able to inspire,” he said. “We didn’t know they were gonna outspend us eleven dollars to one dollar, and yet, we are still standing,” he said. The major dividing line in the Michigan primary has been the story of a progressive insurgency exemplified by Dr. El-Sayed and a more moderate establishment embodied by Ms. Stevens. Many political commentators have remarked that the El-Sayed–Stevens primary is a redux of the 2016 presidential primary between secretary of state Hillary Clinton and Senator Bernie Sanders. Ms. Stevens touted the support of many of Michigan’s most notable Democrats, including Governor Gretchen Whitmer, Senator Gary Peters, and a former senator, Debbie Stabenow. The state’s attorney general, Dana Nessel, and leaders of the state’s Democratic Party also endorsed Ms. Stevens. Dr. El-Sayed, who ran for governor against Ms. Whitmer in 2018, drew on support from the nation’s best-known progressive lawmakers. Mr. Sanders, Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rashida Tlaib, Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, and other prominent members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus all backed Dr. El-Sayed’s campaign. Dr. El-Sayed — who is currently the favorite to win the primary, given his narrow lead — has run on an unabashedly left-wing platform. He wants to establish a universal healthcare system, institute an arms embargo on Israel, and hike taxes on America’s wealthiest. Ms. Stevens, meanwhile, has tacked more toward the center — supporting a public option for health insurance and advocating for additional American support for the Jewish state. No matter who is declared the winner of the primary in the coming hours or days, Michigan will still be one of the most-watched states in the 2026 midterms. Republicans have nominated a former lawmaker, Congressman Mike Rogers, who has raised millions of dollars for his candidacy. National Republicans, too, believe that Michigan is a prime pick-up opportunity for the GOP this year. According to polling, Dr. El-Sayed narrowly trails Mr. Rogers in the general election, while Ms. Stevens narrowly leads the former Republican congressman.

El-Sayed, Stevens Vote for Democratic Senate Nomination in Michigan Is Too Close To Call

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