{"id":77867,"date":"2026-08-25T09:54:48","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T14:54:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2026\/08\/25\/sex-sells-and-wins-votes-and-the-democrats-know-it-arwa-mahdawi\/"},"modified":"2026-08-25T09:54:48","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T14:54:48","slug":"sex-sells-and-wins-votes-and-the-democrats-know-it-arwa-mahdawi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2026\/08\/25\/sex-sells-and-wins-votes-and-the-democrats-know-it-arwa-mahdawi\/","title":{"rendered":"Sex sells and wins votes \u2013 and the Democrats know it | Arwa Mahdawi"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Wonder why they\u2019re posting flirty photos and wearing tight T-shirts? It\u2019s a thirst trap strategy in motion<\/p>\n<p>Despite being a card-carrying member of the International Order of Confirmed Homosexuals, I have spent quite a lot of time lately thinking about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/us-news\/2026\/aug\/05\/michigan-senate-primary-results-abdul-el-sayed\">Abdul El-Sayed\u2019s<\/a> biceps. I mean, have you seen them? The progressive Michigan senate nominee is jacked and he knows it. He almost always wears a tight black T-shirt to show off his muscles and incorporates a lot of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.menshealth.com\/fitness\/a70738011\/political-candidates-fitness-posting-andrew-uz-abdul-el-sayed-cait-conley\/\">fitness content<\/a> in his campaign.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m not the only one who has noticed El-Sayed\u2019s prominent muscles. They have had a lot of coverage, and are seen as part of a wider attempt to rebrand the Democratic party. Which, I don\u2019t need to tell you, has a <a href=\"https:\/\/thehill.com\/opinion\/robbys-radar\/5777165-poll-shows-dem-unpopularity\/\">serious image<\/a> problem; a poll in March found that the party is looked on even less favourably than the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. So, to make it look less like a party that is full of out-of-touch technocrats who sound as if they are reading from a 500-page PowerPoint presentation every time they try to explain anything, Democrats seem to be trying to up the sex appeal.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/tone\/letters\"> letters<\/a> section, please <a href=\"mailto:guardian.letters@theguardian.com?body=Please%20include%20your%20name,%20full%20postal%20address%20and%20phone%20number%20with%20your%20letter%20below.%20Letters%20are%20usually%20published%20with%20the%20author%27s%20name%20and%20city\/town\/village.%20The%20rest%20of%20the%20information%20is%20for%20verification%20only%20and%20to%20contact%20you%20where%20necessary.\">click here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/commentisfree\/2026\/aug\/25\/sex-sells-and-wins-votes-the-democrats-know-it\">Continue reading&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Wonder why they\u2019re posting flirty photos and wearing tight T-shirts? It\u2019s a thirst trap strategy in motion Despite being a card-carrying member of the International Order of Confirmed Homosexuals, I have spent quite a lot of time lately thinking about Abdul El-Sayed\u2019s biceps. I mean, have you seen them? The progressive Michigan senate nominee is &#8230; <a title=\"Sex sells and wins votes \u2013 and the Democrats know it | Arwa Mahdawi\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2026\/08\/25\/sex-sells-and-wins-votes-and-the-democrats-know-it-arwa-mahdawi\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Sex sells and wins votes \u2013 and the Democrats know it | Arwa Mahdawi\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-77867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77867\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}