{"id":3643,"date":"2026-11-02T09:03:47","date_gmt":"2026-11-02T04:03:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=3643"},"modified":"2026-11-02T09:03:47","modified_gmt":"2026-11-02T04:03:47","slug":"michigan-democrats-endorsement-of-republican-ruffles-critical-senate-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=3643","title":{"rendered":"Michigan Democrat’s endorsement of Republican ruffles critical Senate race"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

A prominent Michigan Democrat endorsed Republican Mike Rogers on Sunday, giving President Donald Trump\u2019s<\/a> Republicans an unexpected boost in \u200ba critical US Senate race two days before midterm elections<\/a> that will decide control of Congress.<\/strong><\/p>\n

US Representative Haley Stevens, who lost the Michigan Democrats\u2019 Senate primary to Abdul El-Sayed in a bitterly \u200ccontested race, publicly backed Rogers and appeared with him at a Detroit church, threatening to worsen divisions in a state viewed as crucial to Democratic hopes of retaking the US Senate.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t belong in Abdul\u2019s campaign,\u201d Stevens said in a video posted to social media.<\/p>\n

Hours later at a political rally in Iowa, Trump invited Stevens to join the Republican Party. He told reporters beforehand that he would reach out to her to thank her for the endorsement, which he called \u201ca smart thing to do because El-Sayed would destroy our country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thirty-five Senate seats and \u200ball 435 House of Representatives seats are on the ballot on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

Republicans hold narrow majorities in both chambers. Polls show Democrats are favoured to win a majority of the House and are locked in a \u200btight battle for control of the Senate, where the outcome likely will rest with a handful of states, including Michigan and Alaska.<\/p>\n

If Democrats take control of the House or \u2060Senate, they could block Trump\u2019s legislative agenda for his final two years in office and launch investigations of an administration that has so far faced largely compliant Republican majorities.<\/p>\n

The White House has been preparing<\/a> to implement portions of Trump\u2019s agenda \u200bwithout the aid of Congress, including its tariff pressure<\/a> on trading partners.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Michigan rift<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Stevens\u2019 endorsement of Rogers came on the day she was scheduled to appear with El-Sayed in a show of party unity. But the planned event unravelled after Stevens called \u200bon El-Sayed to condemn an outside group\u2019s ad that she said blames Israel for high grocery prices.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat ad was very painful,\u201d Stevens told CNN on Sunday night. \u201cThere are so many Democrats who want to vote for our Democratic nominee, and they\u2019re just being told, \u2018Hey, this is a party you don\u2019t belong in, or this is a campaign you don\u2019t belong in.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

El-Sayed\u2019s campaign recently asked Stevens to skip his events through Election Day so as \u201cnot to distract from the central issues of the campaign,\u201d a person familiar with the matter said.<\/p>\n

Republicans sought to capitalize \u200bon Stevens\u2019 move. \u201cThis is courage in politics in America today,\u201d Rogers said. \u201cWhen you see a party, and at least a sliver of the party, veering off into the virulent hate that they have been spewing toward a group of \u200bpeople, it gets dangerous.\u201d<\/p>\n

Later on Sunday at the Iowa rally, Trump repeated false claims that El-Sayed is a \u201cjihadist\u201d – attacks that fit a broader pattern of inflammatory rhetoric from Trump and other Republicans targeting Arab Americans and Muslims.<\/p>\n

Stevens\u2019 move did not appear to dent support \u200cfor El-Sayed. A \u2060New York Times\/Siena poll released and partly conducted on Sunday showed the Democratic nominee with a 53% to 42% lead over Rogers.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for El-Sayed\u2019s campaign said that it raised $1.2 million in the four hours after Stevens endorsed Rogers, making it the campaign\u2019s second-best fundraising day since the Democratic primary election in August.<\/p>\n

He declined to address Stevens\u2019 endorsement on Sunday directly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis race was never about me,\u201d El-Sayed told MS NOW. \u201cIt was never even about Mike Rogers.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s certainly not about Haley Stevens. This race is about the people in the state of Michigan, the people that I\u2019ve gotten to know in their churches and synagogues, in their basements and their living rooms, talking about what they need and deserve.\u201c<\/p>\n

Several \u200bStevens\u2019 congressional staff resigned over the endorsement, according to \u200breports from CNN and the Hill, while some voters expressed \u2060disdain.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaley Stevens is a traitor,\u201d said Pamela Johnson, 72, after voting for El-Sayed in Warren, a Detroit suburb.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Alaska intervention falters<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Also on Sunday, the Trump administration\u2019s attempt to intervene in Alaska\u2019s Senate race faltered when a federal judge dismissed the US Justice Department\u2019s lawsuit seeking to block certification of the results if Republican incumbent Senator Dan S. Sullivan narrowly \u200bloses.<\/p>\n

The Justice Department argued voters may be confused by the presence of a challenger named Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. on the same ballot.<\/p>\n

The issue has roiled the campaign \u200bover the last several days after \u2060the New York Times reported that Democrat Mary Peltola\u2019s campaign was involved in recruiting Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. into the race as a spoiler.<\/p>\n

The senator said on Sunday he would accept the results of Tuesday\u2019s election even as the Trump administration presses a criminal investigation into the issue.<\/p>\n

But Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy, a Republican, has suggested he may not certify a victory by Peltola, and the incumbent Sullivan declined to say whether he would support efforts to refuse certification.<\/p>\n

He joined his party colleagues in accusing \u2060the other Sullivan \u200bof trying to confuse voters with his similar name.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey got the decoy guy on the ballot,\u201d the senator told CNN\u2019s \u201cState of the Union\u201d \u200bprogram. \u201cI\u2019m sure I\u2019m going to lose a lot of votes to that trickery. So what I say to Alaskans is, \u2018Don\u2019t let them get away with the tricks.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Peltola has denied involvement, and Sullivan Jr. has denied coordinating with Peltola\u2019s campaign.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A prominent Michigan Democrat endorsed Republican Mike Rogers on Sunday, giving President Donald Trump\u2019s Republicans an unexpected boost in \u200ba critical US Senate race two days before midterm elections that will decide control of Congress. US Representative Haley Stevens, who lost the Michigan Democrats\u2019 Senate primary to Abdul El-Sayed in a bitterly \u200ccontested race, publicly backed Rogers and appeared with him at a Detroit church, threatening to worsen divisions in a state viewed as crucial to Democratic hopes of retaking the US Senate. \u201cI don\u2019t belong in Abdul\u2019s campaign,\u201d Stevens…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3643\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}