Senate Democratic candidate Abdul el Sayed claimed that “preemptively” banning sharia would be discriminatory and lashed out at his November rival, Mike Rogers, as a “beta.”
In an at-times heated interview on Fox News’s Jesse Watters Primetime, el Sayed was confronted over his past comments that it was white supremacy to ban sharia, a religious law followed by Muslims. El Sayed began by comparing it to Christian canon law, a set of nonlegally binding rules and regulations that govern the conduct of members and parishes.
“I don’t begrudge you your right to practice your faith as you choose. I don’t know why the idea that I could practice my faith as I choose is a problem. Nobody is trying to push sharia law on anyone else. Just like I hope nobody is trying to push canon law on anybody else, because we live in America, where you should have the freedom of your religion,” he said.
“So the idea that you have somebody like [Sen.] Tommy Tuberville, who, you know, barely was good at coaching football, is out here trying to ban sharia law when there’s less than 1% of the Muslim community in America, as if somehow Muslims are out here trying to push sharia law. That seems to me to be deliberately targeting the Muslim community because they’re different,” el Sayed argued.
“When people preemptively go out there and start preemptively passing laws to ban something that’s not happening, what you’re trying to do is target a very small community because they’re different,” he added.
At another point, he taunted Rogers, calling him a “beta,” a slang term for a weak individual, and claimed Jesse Watters agreed with the description after the host laughed.
El Sayed said he has only “one goal right now: It is to win Michigan. So we’re looking forward to doing that. And given the fact that Mike Rogers, who you agree is a beta, is my opponent, it probably shouldn’t be very hard.”
ABDUL EL SAYED OPPOSES HASAN PIKER AFTER MICHIGAN DEMOCRAT CALLS HIM A ‘HACK’ AND ‘DANGEROUS’
El Sayed’s victory in the Democratic primary served as one of the most high-profile victories of the socialist wing of the party, and has drawn him controversial associations.
The Michigan Senate race is considered one of the closest and most influential of the 2026 midterm cycle and will prove a testing ground for the electability of hard-left candidates in swing states.