{"id":80553,"date":"2026-10-27T12:55:06","date_gmt":"2026-10-27T17:55:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2026\/10\/27\/former-rival-dodges-full-throated-el-sayed-endorsement-after-bitter-senate-primary\/"},"modified":"2026-10-27T12:55:06","modified_gmt":"2026-10-27T17:55:06","slug":"former-rival-dodges-full-throated-el-sayed-endorsement-after-bitter-senate-primary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/2026\/10\/27\/former-rival-dodges-full-throated-el-sayed-endorsement-after-bitter-senate-primary\/","title":{"rendered":"Former rival dodges full-throated El-Sayed endorsement after bitter Senate primary"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich., repeatedly stopped short of saying she was “fully behind” Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed<\/a> when pressed on national television Sunday, months after he narrowly defeated her in a bitter primary and just days before the midterm elections.<\/p>\n

CNN’s Dana Bash first pressed Stevens on why she has yet to campaign alongside El-Sayed despite endorsing him after the primary. Stevens responded by pointing to her work campaigning for Democratic House candidates across Michigan.<\/p>\n

But when Bash later asked directly whether she was “still fully behind” El-Sayed, Stevens again stopped short of saying yes.<\/p>\n

MICHIGAN DEMOCRAT HALEY STEVENS BACKS EL-SAYED AFTER NARROW PRIMARY DEFEAT, CALLS SOCIALISM \u2018DANGEROUS\u2019<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

“Look, I’m on the Democratic ticket,” Stevens said. “I can’t say that I agree with everything that’s gone on.”<\/p>\n

Stevens instead highlighted her support for Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jocelyn Benson<\/a> and House candidates, but not El-Sayed.<\/p>\n

Bash pointed out that she had not mentioned him.<\/p>\n

“Well, look, I would just say you asked me if I’m still on the team,” Stevens responded. “I’m on the team.”<\/p>\n

HALEY STEVENS URGES EL-SAYED TO DITCH HASAN PIKER AFFILIATION AFTER MICHIGAN PRIMARY<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

The exchange underscores lingering tensions inside the Michigan Democratic coalition<\/a> following a contentious Senate primary that exposed divisions over Israel, Iran and the direction of the party. Stevens’ supporters included constituencies El-Sayed has been working to consolidate behind his campaign, particularly Black and Jewish voters<\/a>, as he faces Republican Mike Rogers in the general election.<\/p>\n

Stevens also suggested Sunday that El-Sayed has more work to do with some of the voters who backed her in the primary.<\/p>\n

BLACK VOTERS RIP DEMS OVER TAKING THEM FOR GRANTED IN EL-SAYED’S BACKYARD: \u2018HUSH US UP\u2019<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

When asked whether El-Sayed had done enough to reach her former supporters in Michigan’s Black and Jewish communities, Stevens pointed specifically to outreach she had urged him to make to Black voters.<\/p>\n

“I had said to, you know, the coordinated campaign, I’m like, hey, give a speech in the Black community, right?” Stevens said.<\/p>\n

“But yeah, I mean, that didn’t happen,” she added. “That speech hasn’t happened.”<\/p>\n

SIGN UP TO GET THE POLITICS NEWSLETTER<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

El-Sayed is facing former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers<\/a> in the closely watched race to succeed retiring Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, with the Michigan seat central to the battle for control of the Senate.<\/p>\n

The contest has emerged as a test of the Democratic Party’s progressive wing, with El-Sayed campaigning on policies including Medicare-for-all and an end to U.S. military aid to Israel, while Rogers has sought to portray him as outside Michigan’s political mainstream.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich., repeatedly stopped short of saying she was “fully behind” Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed when pressed on national television Sunday, months after he narrowly defeated her in a bitter primary and just days before the midterm elections. CNN’s Dana Bash first pressed Stevens on why she has yet to campaign alongside … 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-80553","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\/80553","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=80553"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/80553\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=80553"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=80553"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news2shorts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=80553"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}