El-Sayed Winning Donor Race; Pro-Stevens Team Spending Much More; Whitmer Backs Haley

Article courtesy of MIRS for SBAM’s Lansing Watchdog newsletter

(DETROIT) – Federal campaign reports released late Thursday show Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed raised more than twice as much into his hard-money campaign account from July 1-15 as opponent U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Birmingham), while drawing nearly three times as many donors.

But whatever advantage El-Sayed can claim from his campaign’s fundraising is being overwhelmed by an unprecedented torrent of outside money supporting Stevens. Six political action committees have combined to spend $58.9 million on her behalf, according to AdImpact, the most outside spending ever devoted to a single candidate in a U.S. Senate race.

Standing in front of the Spirit of Detroit Friday morning, El-Sayed argued candidates who are truly electable shouldn’t need corporations and special interests spending tens of millions of dollars to win their party’s nomination.

“The people need and deserve a government that’s going to guarantee its own people health care rather than send our money somewhere else to drop bombs on other people,” El-Sayed said. “Maybe ‘electable candidates’ are the ones who don’t need $60 million from corporations and special interests to run and win campaigns. Maybe electable candidates aren’t the ones who have to carpet bomb the airwaves with 30-second glossy ads lying about themselves and about their opponents.”

Stevens added another significant asset Friday when Gov. Gretchen Whitmer endorsed her candidacy, saying the two share the same guiding principle – “getting stuff done for Michigan.”

“Governor Whitmer embodies what it means to be ‘that woman from Michigan’ and everything that makes our state so special,” Stevens said. “She’s authentically Michigan – and I could not be more honored to have her endorsement for U.S. Senate. Let’s go win!”

First, El-Sayed reported having received $2.3 million from July 1-15, bringing his campaign’s total raised to $14.49 million, more than the $888,393 raised during the same time period by the Stevens campaign. In fact, the former Wayne County Health director went beyond that disclosure by announcing Wednesday that he’s actually raised $3.3 million for the entire month of July, from July 1 to July 22 by that point, but that number is not directly comparable to Stevens’ FEC figure for July 1-15.

Stevens raised $9.86 million for her campaign as of July 15. The total dollar amount is lower than what was raised by Mallory McMorrow (D-Royal Oak), who suspended her campaign July 5. McMorrow raised $11.21 million, including $66,766 from July 1 to July 5.

A deeper look into the FEC filings shows El-Sayed received contributions from 3,104 unique contributors from July 1-15, 1,226 of whom were from Michigan. Stevens had 1,061 unique contributors, 364 of whom were from Michigan. McMorrow had 267 unique contributors in five days, 108 from Michigan.

“It’s clear which campaign has the momentum to launch a successful general election campaign,” said El-Sayed campaign spokesperson Sophie Pollock. “While Haley Stevens’ fundraising shrinks, Abdul continues to bring new, diverse Michiganders into a movement that is growing by the day. To keep Michigan blue, we must nominate the most electable Democrat in this race.”

Her campaign saw an additional boost Friday afternoon from Gov. Gretchen Whitmer. A press release from the Stevens campaign pointed to Stevens and Whitmer collaborating together on bringing “unprecedented federal resources” to Michigan, gun reform, the CHIPs and Science Act, prescription drug cost relief and other reforms.

Stevens is sewing up the support from Michigan’s top Democratic officials – U.S. Sen. Gary Peters (D-Oakland County), Attorney General Dana Nessel, former Gov. Jennifer Granholm and former U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, among others, while El-Sayed locked up the backing of the UAW and a long list of progressive organizations that has weighed into the race.

Friday morning, in a “Michigan Is Not For Sale” press conference, El-Sayed and a cluster of his supporters argued that Stevens has benefited from $59 million in outside spending, and “that money doesn’t come for free.”

The dollars are linked to the pharmaceutical industry, big technology companies interested in constructing large-scale data centers and corporations that can benefit from buying back stock from earnings will influence Stevens’ decision-making.

As for the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), El-Sayed pointed to earlier this month, when Stevens chose not to join nearly half of the U.S. House Democrats who attempted to cut off $3.3 billion in aid to Israel through a State Department spending bill amendment.

While El-Sayed has condemned the outside spending favoring Stevens’ campaign, the Stevens campaign has criticized El-Sayed for not disclosing his own financial assets. They’ve described El-Sayed as promising to get darkness out of politics, but not supplying voters with public details on where his personal wealth comes from.

El-Sayed’s campaign does say he intends to release such personal disclosures ahead of Aug. 4. However, for mid-July he did release his 2025 federal tax return, showing that him and his wife made $686,069 last year, comprising of $130,749 in wages, $262,299 in capital gains and $292,881 from other income arteries.

Joining him at Friday’s press conference was Donna Givens Davidson, president of the Eastside Community Network, a neighborhood growth nonprofit; President Jamie Brown of National Nurses United and Amber Love, a local United Auto Workers (UAW) board member and vice president of the ABD Federal Credit Union’s board of directors.

“It’s money against the many, and our history teaches us, from the sit-down strike to the march in Washington, that when the people stand together, we can all prevail over power. But it takes hard work, and it takes solidarity,” Love said. “It’s why me and my union brothers and sisters are knocking doors.”

El-Sayed spent about five minutes answering questions from the press, which included:

MIRS: Have you ever said no to a 501(c)4 that wanted to support you because you didn’t like the lack of transparency of 501(c)4s? 

El-Sayed: “Yes, but here’s more important: the 501(c)4s don’t come and ask me. They already know where I stand.

“I’ve never met with a corporate lobbyist. You know why? Because they already know where I stand. I don’t take those meetings in the first place.”

The Detroit News: Haley Stevens’ campaign sent out a fake press release yesterday, claiming to be from your campaign, saying that Mike Rogers has endorsed you. Do you have any reaction to this? Does this concern you? 

El-Sayed: “Lies generally concern me, and…I think this is really more a question for the FEC. I think it’s pretty clear that they probably violated FEC election law in doing that, but it’s also a testament to where that campaign is going.

“And at some point, a campaign that’s confident about its success, a campaign that isn’t worried about having already burnt $59 million of other people’s money and has nothing to show for it, doesn’t do things like that, right?

“And so we’re trying to focus on what it looks like to build and win the future rather than to lie about our opponent and pretend something that happened didn’t happen, but that’s between them and the FEC.”

MIRS: “What was your reaction to Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald (not supporting) on Fox 2 this week…the AG on the Democratic side, claiming that extremism is taking place in the party right now? 

El-Sayed: “I just want to say it is odd when you’re unwilling to endorse a Jewish candidate for Attorney General because you’re afraid of the extremism in the party and the antisemitism in the party. I just think it’s important for us to recognize that the democratic process is the democratic process, and we have to be willing to abide by the democratic process.

“As anti-democratic party as this much spending in a primary is, I just think it’s important for us not to play games with words, and I should hope that we are going to back the Democratic Party ticket, right?

“The Attorney General nominee Eli Savit has a strong history in Washtenaw County, and I should hope that the people who ran against him are willing to support him over the alternative on the Republican side.

“So look, we got work to do. But I do think that it’s important for us always to differentiate between Judaism, the Jewish people and antisemitism, and on the other side, righteous indignation about what our government has funded on the part of the actions of a foreign government. Those are not the same, and I think people are sometimes deliberately trying to misconstrue those things, and I think it does us all harm.

“Particularly, if the outcome here is that you are not supporting the Jewish American nominee for Attorney General.”

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