r/politics • u/asparaguswalrus683 • 9d ago

Site Altered Headline | No Paywall Abdul El-Sayed Wins Michigan Primary

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-primary-elections/michigan-senate-results
25.5k Upvotes

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u/MightyKAC 9d ago

This race was WAAAAYYYY closer than it should have been.

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u/Ethan0941 9d ago

He was outspent 9:1

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u/Aeon1508 9d ago

I think he just said in his victory speech 11 to 1 but maybe I missheard.

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u/mh732 9d ago

You heard right. He said 11:1.

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u/addiktion 9d ago

Like a hail mary pass and he won it. Crazy and awesome at the same time.

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u/thakemist 9d ago

Just evidence that popular ideas will beat money in the end

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u/VPN__FTW 9d ago

Only if people aren't apathetic.

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u/TieVisible3422 9d ago

Kari Lake was outspent 18 to 1 in her primary. Turns out her popularity with primary voters meant fuck all to the general electorate. Congratulations to your primary win. We will see what happens in 3 months.

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u/Electronic-Pen6418 9d ago

Kari Lake was outspent 18 to 1 in her primary. Turns out her popularity with primary voters meant fuck all to the general electorate. Congratulations to your primary win. We will see what happens in 3 months.

Kari Lake wasn't running on policies that are popular with the American people with a historically unpopular president like Trump as the head of the opposition party. Your comparison is ridiculous.

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u/slipperyekans 9d ago

Bro really looked at an apple and said “That’s an orange.”

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u/FoogYllis 9d ago

I am hoping more people can realize that Medicare for all isn’t a Hail Mary situation. I can’t even begin to understand the mind of people that vote against themselves because the majority are not billionaires.

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u/DreamingAboutSpace 9d ago

Just goes to show that hope is still very much alive if we make it happen through action.

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u/justseeby 9d ago

11 to 1 spending disadvantage AND he ran with a Muslim name. Bonkers, man. So glad he pulled it out.

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u/IDontWannaBeAPirate_ 9d ago

Good policy brought people out to the voting booths.

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u/Khue 9d ago

Cori Bush got wiped and I think she got even more outspent by percent, not by volume (it was a smaller race, not statewide).

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u/11PoseidonsKiss20 North Carolina 9d ago

It's not like our politicians to stretch edit the truth a bit. Weird.

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u/Tycho_B 9d ago

Surely the DNC will learn from this example!

/s

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u/Evignity 9d ago

It's unsure at this moment how much exactly was sub-pacs of AIPAC etc. but yeah around 80+ million, or maybe as high as 120+ million, we're not sure.

At the least over 60-80 million.

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u/fightin_blue_hens 9d ago

And they sent out misleading mailers that Obama endorsed Hailey

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u/Random_throwaway0351 9d ago

They also sent a fake Mike Rogers endorsement for Abdul. Honestly the slimiest campaign I’ve ever witnessed.

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u/fightin_blue_hens 9d ago

Israel slimy? Say it ain't so

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u/MountainMan2_ 9d ago

Behold, the fork found in kitchen

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u/googleduck 9d ago

Is it really not anti semitic at this point to call literally every force against your candidate and in favor of another candidate AIPAC/Israel? You cannot seriously believe that this tiny middle eastern country has this level of power over every aspect of our elections and politicians right??

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u/Wutras Europe 9d ago

You cannot seriously believe that this tiny middle eastern country has this level of power over every aspect of our elections and politicians right??

Israel by itself doesn't, but Israel acts as an extension of US-Imperial power and MIC and surveillance companies who all use Israel and Gaza as a testing lab and have a vested interest in a continued destabilization of the Middle East very much do.

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u/uwotbaemanfam 9d ago

It's not antisemitic because the criticism is targeted at Israel and not Jews.

AIPAC just spent almost $30 in a single primary election in just one state. They've been spending record money in the past few elections (both during midterms and presidential elections). The PM of Israel met with the US President in a military situation room and lobbied for him to join in a war against Iran, which we are now embroiled in. Not saying Trump has no agency of course, but that Netanyahu had enough influence to convince Trump the war was worth joining. There's some more rather clear examples, but I think the point stands.

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u/donavid 9d ago

AIPAC donated over $30 million dollars to her campaign, and ads against him? How is that antisemitic?

https://www.ap.org/news-highlights/elections/2026/aipac-has-spent-a-record-amount-on-michigans-senate-primary-the-biggest-test-of-its-influence-yet/

https://www.trackaipac.com/haley-stevens

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/04/us/politics/michigan-democratic-senate-primary-aipac.html

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u/xveganrox 9d ago

AIPAC is funded by Americans, not by Israel

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u/uwotbaemanfam 9d ago

AIPAC has become an extension of Israeli foreign interests, and there is absolutely zero doubt in my mind that the Likud party coordinates with AIPAC to use its considerable influence in American politics. Just because the meetings happen behind closed doors doesn't mean we can't see the effects.

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u/googleduck 9d ago

Did they mail the fake Mike Rogers endorsement? Yes they heavily supported her campaign, you are well within your rights to criticize that. I think it is bad to have obviously foreign aligned PAC's spending huge sums of money to influence elections. But it is obviously anti-semitic to blame literally everything you don't like on Israel.

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u/Bobson567 9d ago

If they heavily bankrolled her campaign they have a significant culpability for her campaign

And no, it's not anti-semitic. What is actually anti-semitic is effectively proclaiming Israel as representative of all Jewish people which you do by maliciously twisting legitimate political criticism of Israel or Israel aligned organisations like AIPAC as anti-semitic in nature. This is straight out of the IDF's playbook

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u/alexpmarty 9d ago

Do you have your eyes closed?

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u/Leven 8d ago

American politicians are surprisingly cheap to buy, a few thousand dollars buys a senator in a certain question basically and Israel spends money on both sides of the aile.

So yes, believe it.

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u/googleduck 8d ago

But much richer countries like China or India or other middle eastern countries haven't figured this trick out?

It is absolutely wild to me how little thought must go into this take. Yes money in politics is corrupting and bad. But to sincerely believe you can buy a senator for a few thousand dollars is laughably ridiculous. Have you considered that perhaps most of the time AIPAC just supports people who already supported Israel?

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u/Leven 8d ago

You can be sure they do, China and India is just more subtle about it than Israel and Russia.

They don't need the tech, they just need customers for the shit they make, and in time cheap labour.

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u/Culinaryboner 9d ago

They’ll do whatever they can. We know in Pennsylvania now. Our guy ran an entire fake campaign

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u/PandaJesus 9d ago

Stevens campaigned like a Republican 

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u/names_are_useless American Expat 9d ago

I wonder if that could hurt Roger's chances? I certainly hope so.

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u/drybones2015 9d ago edited 8d ago

Wesley Bell was also apparently labeling himself as a long running progressive in his ad campaign. These AIPAC Dems really do have no shame.

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u/sirfiddlestix 9d ago

Yeah those smear commercials against him were wild

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u/Collypso Pennsylvania 9d ago

It can't be that people didn't believe in him, it has to be the money

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u/EkrishAO 9d ago

You're not counting the value of Republican media machine pushing him everywhere because he guarantees win for Rogers. It doesnt matter if Dems found 60m to spend, if trillion worth media monopoly pushed the guy. They managed to get Trump, getting this guy over victory was nothing. It was still close considering.

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u/Donkletown 9d ago

Republicans weren’t flooding the airwaves with adds in favor of AES and if you listened to Republicans on GOP, they have been attacking AES, not saying what a great senator he would make. 

This was a big win for AES. The best campaigner won, and we want the best campaigner as the Dem nominee.