El-Sayed Fires Back at Trump, Vows He Will Be ‘Senator Mohamed’ After November

Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed hit back Sunday at President Trump’s attacks on his faith, telling supporters the president will be calling him “Senator Mohamed” if he wins in November.

Speaking at a rally in Grand Rapids, El-Sayed accused the president of taking issue with his name while overlooking foreign interests tied to his own circle.
“I get that the president of the United States takes personal offense to my first name,” El-Sayed said. “He doesn’t mind as much when it’s a shared name from the Saudis who are funding his son-in-law’s private equity. Doesn’t seem to mind as much when it’s the Qataris who are giving him a $400 million private jet. He just seems to have trouble pronouncing it when it’s my name.”

“But y’all, I don’t care how he pronounces my name,” he continued. “I don’t even care that he remembers my whole name. Because he can just go on and call me ‘senator’ after November. I will be Senator Mohamed to you, bro.”

If elected, El-Sayed would become the first Muslim American to serve in the Senate.

Trump has repeatedly targeted El-Sayed’s faith on the campaign trail, mocking his name and alleging the candidate has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist group founded in Egypt that has influenced and supported fundamentalist movements across the region.

The president has labeled the Detroit-area physician a “terrorist sympathizer” and a “jihadist,” and has referred to him as “Mohamed El-Sayed.”

El-Sayed, whose full name is Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed, is Muslim and was born in Michigan to Egyptian immigrant parents.

While rallying in Michigan on Sunday for El-Sayed’s Republican opponent, Rep. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., Trump claimed El-Sayed would “have to go through a metal detector before he’s allowed to go into the Senate.”

Trump then compared El-Sayed to the hijackers behind the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks after introducing speaker David Beamer, whose son, Todd Beamer, was among the passengers killed aboard United Flight 93, according to Reuters.

“Twenty-five years later, Michigan needs to stand up and fight just like Todd did to stop a jihadist from walking into the Capitol,” Trump said.
Rogers has also raised the Muslim Brotherhood issue, telling the crowd Sunday that the group “celebrated exactly one victory in the United States in the primary this year. Abdul El-Sayed’s.”
But Rogers drew a line when asked on NBC’s “Meet the Press” whether he agreed with Trump’s past remarks calling El-Sayed a “violent terrorist.”

“No, I don’t,” Rogers told host Kristen Welker. “I’ve never called him a terrorist. I’ve never called him a terrorist. This election is about me versus Abdul. I mean, he’s a Democrat Socialist of America-aligned candidate who has these pretty radical support groups that don’t like America. I think those are issues people ought to decide their election on.”

Rogers said El-Sayed “just won’t answer the question” about any alleged connection to the Muslim Brotherhood, and told Welker his opponent “is getting money from groups that support the Muslim Brotherhood. Money from groups that support Hamas and Hezbollah.”

El-Sayed has strongly denied any personal ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Republicans, however, have surfaced past statements by El-Sayed that they say show sympathy for the Islamist movement, which briefly took over Egypt in 2012 and 2013.