Democrat beats Mike Rogers 52.5% to 45.5% to become the first Muslim elected to the Senate, after months of lines about yachts, Florida and drug companies
Democrat Abdul El-Sayed won Michigan’s open U.S. Senate seat on Tuesday, defeating Republican former Rep. Mike Rogers to become the first Muslim elected to the Senate. In his victory speech, he told Rogers to “enjoy your retirement,” CBS Detroit reported.
El-Sayed led 52.5% to 45.5% with about 97.5% of the expected vote counted, according to unofficial NBC News results. He succeeds retiring Democratic Sen. Gary Peters.
The line capped months of attacks on Rogers’ wealth, Florida home and drug-industry ties, which fact-checkers found ranged from partly grounded to false.
‘Enjoy Your Retirement’
El-Sayed declared victory in Detroit before the AP called the race. Republicans had repeatedly tried to link him to terrorist organizations, with no evidence of such ties.
“You chose hate and Michigan chose hope,” El-Sayed said, according to the Associated Press.
“They might have been pointing to my name and my faith, but we all know my name and my faith are not why you can’t afford your gas,” he said.
Rogers’ statement Wednesday thanked voters and said “we have a state to save, now more than ever.” It did not concede or mention El-Sayed, CBS Detroit noted. Rogers, 63, lost the 2024 Senate race to Elissa Slotkin by 20,000 votes.
Yachts, Florida and a ‘Pharma Lobbyist’
In June, Rogers’ campaign sent El-Sayed a cease-and-desist letter over his claim that Rogers had taken a $14 million payout as a pharmaceutical lobbyist, PolitiFact reported.
El-Sayed answered in a video: “My mistake, he just spent so much time in Congress helping the pharmaceutical industry that I thought he was a pharma lobbyist.”
“When I say Mike Rogers, do not think of a pharma lobbyist. When I say pharma lobbyist, do not think of a Mike Rogers,” he added.
On primary night in August, he told supporters that despite the letter, “if it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, smells like a duck. How am I supposed to know it’s a goose?” according to Bridge Michigan.
On Aug. 5, he turned to Florida. “Not in Michigan. No, winters are too cold for him. He’s got thin skin after all. He went to Florida,” El-Sayed told a crowd, a Bridge Michigan fact check recorded.
“So, Mike, if you want to be a Florida man, go be a Florida man,” he said.
When El-Sayed later pressed him over a debate invitation, Rogers wrote that “my calendar has been a little jammed up, I’ve been traveling the state meeting with the majority Democrats who didn’t vote for you.”
At their first debate, on Oct. 8 in Grand Rapids, El-Sayed called Rogers “Weak, cowardly, won’t stand up until his poll numbers drop”, Mediaite reported.
“How many yachts?” El-Sayed asked, then held up two fingers toward the cameras. “The hypocrisy here is absolutely astounding,” Rogers said, without directly answering.
When El-Sayed asked about the yachts again, Rogers replied, “I never owned a yacht in Florida, brother,” according to Bridge Michigan’s yacht review.
At the second debate, on Oct. 21, El-Sayed repeatedly called Rogers’ answers “MAGA bingo” and cast him as Trump’s “sock puppet,” Fox News reported. Rogers accused him of a “pattern of deception.”
What the Fact-Checks Found
PolitiFact rated the $14 million pharma-lobbyist claim Pants on Fire. Rogers was never a registered lobbyist, and PolitiFact found no record that he worked for drug companies after leaving Congress.
His wealth did grow: PolitiFact estimated his net worth at $10.1 million to $16.9 million, including homes, which 60 Minutes noted reflects net worth, not earnings.
The yacht line has some basis. Bridge Michigan found Rogers registered a 32-foot boat in Maryland in 2015 and a 39-foot Cruisers Yachts vessel in 2017, but the first was sold before the second was registered. Neither registration was tied to a Florida address. A Rogers spokesperson called the claim “another lie.”
The Florida home is real, though in the past. Rogers and his wife bought a Cape Coral house for about $1.6 million in 2022 and listed it as their permanent residence in 2023, Bridge Michigan found. He now lives in White Lake Township.
Rogers, for his part, accused El-Sayed and his family of ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, echoing Trump’s attacks on El-Sayed. El-Sayed has denied any ties and disavowed the group. Rogers also raised El-Sayed’s overseas property: two disclosed rentals his wife owns, in Dubai and Bangalore, India.
How El-Sayed Built His Coalition
El-Sayed beat Rep. Haley Stevens in the August primary by about 1 percentage point, though Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Peters backed her. Stevens endorsed Rogers on Nov. 1.
His biggest margins came in metro Detroit. He won Detroit with more than 92% of the vote and Dearborn with more than 82%, and carried Wayne County by more than 43 points, according to AP figures reported by FOX 2 Detroit.
He won Oakland County by 14.4 points; Rogers took Macomb by 1.8. Trump carried Macomb by 13 points in 2024, NBC News reported.
El-Sayed also campaigned heavily in rural and northern Michigan, where NBC News found Rogers trailing Trump’s 2024 margins. NBC calculates the race moved 8.42 points toward Democrats from 2024.
The NBC News Exit Poll found El-Sayed won 69% of voters under 30, 86% of Black voters and 92% of Muslim voters, and carried union members 58% to 41%. His Black support ran about 4 points below a typical Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan, NBC said.
Money, Endorsements and a National Wave
El-Sayed ran on Medicare for All, getting money out of politics and higher taxes on the wealthy. Sen. Bernie Sanders helped build early momentum, and former President Barack Obama and former Vice President Kamala Harris campaigned with him in Detroit.
The primary drew nearly $60 million in outside spending, and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee spent nearly $30 million against him, its largest investment in a single race, the AP reported.
Rogers had to answer for the president. The AP reported he struggled to balance loyalty to Trump with prices tied to the war with Iran and turmoil from tariffs, including Trump’s tariffs on Canada. He broke with Trump on both, writing in September that “The war with Iran needs to end, and end quickly.”
Voters were split on whether El-Sayed is too extreme, but said by 24 points that Rogers is too supportive of Trump, the NBC News Exit Poll found.
The result was part of Democrats’ midterm wins across red states, which gave the party control of both chambers. Michigan’s seat was already held by a Democrat, so El-Sayed’s win keeps it rather than flipping it.
Featured image from: Conlan Houston, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons