'Despicable betrayal' | Democrat defects days before midterms

There is another story, a final story from you today, which highlights a little trouble at the mill for the Democratic Party. Yeah, and I don't want to make too much of the specifics of this story. It's taking place in Michigan. There's been an internal row between Abdul El-Sayed, according to this poll, about to become the first Muslim ever elected to the U.S. Senate, a Democrat, of course, from the progressive wing of the party, and the woman that he defeated. In the primary contest, the Democratic primary earlier this year, Haley Stevens, she is currently a Congresswoman. She'll be leaving her post in January because she didn't win that Senate primary. She, over the weekend, turned against Abdel El-Sayed and endorsed his Republican challenger, Mike Rogers, over an advertisement that was placed by a third-party political action committee ...funded by Cenk Uygur of the Young Turks, this incendiary left-wing news opinion network. He's the uncle of Hasan Piker, who also has been controversial in Michigan because of his relationship with Abdel El-Sayed, and of course is another incendiary progressive who was actually banned from travelling to Britain just a few months ago because of his views on... Palestine. So this ad came out. It looked like it was an Abdul El-Sayed ad and it made a host of allegations suggesting that Michigans, when they go and buy their groceries, are having to put groceries back on the shelves because they've got to send the money instead to the American government so that the American government can send the money to Israel so Israel can carry on killing Palestinians Controversial ad. Hayley Stevens challenged Abdel El-Sayed to condemn it. He didn't for several days. On Saturday, he dissociated himself from the ad. But on Sunday, she backed Mike Rogers. What is important about this is that it presages Possible turmoil within the Democratic Party over the issue of the Middle East. Last night, appearing on CNN, Haley Stevens told Anderson Cooper she was just one in a long line of Democratic Party dissidents. Democrats, when they go into the chamber, sometimes they don't always vote with the party. You know, we've seen I wasn't for the Biden switch around. You said in a press conference today, we can't stand with hate. Do you believe that Abdel El-Sayed is hateful or an anti-Semite? I think some of the actions have certainly been anti-Semitic, Anderson, but I'm just sick of who he stands with. And what she means by that, of course, is Cenk Uygur and Hasan Piker and the Young Turks and left wingers that she believes that are deeply critical of Israel, of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which, of course, funds races all over the country, AIPAC backing supporters of Israel. This Israel issue, never mind what's happening in Michigan, in microcosm. It's going to be a huge issue for the Democrats and indeed for the Republicans to deal with because both parties are split now between traditional supporters of Joe Biden's view in the Democratic Party that the party's support for Israel needs to be ironclad and all the younger progressives, many of whom may get elected to Congress tomorrow, who say America's got to drop Israel like a hot potato. Similar splits on the Republican side. The Democrats are not close to being ready to confront that issue and to deal with it in a timely fashion. Amazing. Make sure you get some kit before the before the big one. Always a pleasure to hear from you, Simon Marks, live from Washington, D.C., with the very latest on the midterms and a little local difficulty there within the Democratic Party. There's a row has broken out. in the kind of extraordinary moment has has landed really in the middle of the campaign or towards the end of the campaign around a candidate called Abdul El-Sayed. He is the Democratic candidate to be a senator in Michigan. The president, Donald Trump, has said a lot about him over the midterm campaign. As you probably know, he's a flavor of what the president thinks about Mr. El-Sayed. I call him Mohammed. He goes by Abdul. Abdul Ramadan. I called him Mohammed. Then I found out his name was actually his middle name is Mohammed. No, he's I would say he's changed. I would think equally as much. These are people we can't have these people in the United States and with with with him. I don't know if we have to do with Telefrico, but with the guy up in Michigan, we're going to have to get to the, you know, the test, the metal detector test before he's allowed to sit every day. He's referring to James Tallarico, the Texan candidate for the Democrats, who's giving him a run for his money. Well, here is Mr. Al-Sayed, who the president was just talking about, for those of you who might not know much about him. Recently, he said that I should have to go through a metal detector. It's all right, man. He took that Wolverine thing seriously. He knows I got claws. But here's the deal, Donald. Listen, I'll go through a metal detector if you'll sit for a lie detector. Simple. I got nothing to hide. You've got so much to hide. My first question, Epstein. I am. So you think it's okay for a parent to slash his kid's thing on the university? You think that's okay? I mean, do you really want to have this conversation? Are you circumcised? Yeah, yeah, but I mean, that's a personal question, doctor. You probably should want to move on. You probably should want to move on. I get that the President of the United States takes personal offense to my first name. 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. I don't even care that he remembers my whole name. Because he can just go on and call me Senator after November. Well, yesterday, a Democratic representative, so ostensibly a colleague of Mr. El-Sayed, her name's Hayley Stevens, she posted this on Twitter, endorsing the Republican senator candidate, Mike Rogers, over her own party's candidate, Abdul El-Sayed. Hey, Michigan. As you may have seen, our Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate, Abdul, said that I was no longer welcome in his campaign and that I should stay away. And he's right. And that's why I am endorsing Mike Rogers for the United States Senate today. I don't belong in Abdul's campaign. I do not stand with Hassan Piker, who gets trafficked on our college campuses. A dear friend of mine earlier today was saying that education is on the ballot. And she's absolutely right. And what our students see, what our children see, and who we are as Michiganders is not hate and is not what we are getting out from our Democratic nominee right now. Well, here is Abdul El-Sayed's response to Haley Stevens' endorsement of his opponent. Do you believe that Haley Stevens has betrayed the Republican Party? You didn't hear what I just said. Do you believe that she has betrayed the Republican Party? Has she betrayed the Democratic Party? I don't know what that party is anymore. Has she betrayed the Democratic Party? At the end of the day, I actually don't think about Haley Stevens. I'm joined by John Scardino, spokesperson for Democrats Abroad UK. Good afternoon to you, John. All right, thanks so much for having me. Does this tell us more about the Democrats' own issues than anything else? It splits. I'm not sure that it does. I mean, I think I've been impressed with what I've seen from Mr. Al-Sayed and from the state Democratic Party in Michigan and from the National Democratic Party since then. And I'm pleased that consistently... And I think as Mr. Al-Sayed said, this is an issue that doesn't really matter to the nine million or so people in Michigan. It is a bit of drama. It is a bit colorful. But I don't think it really is more than some sort of political stunt that I don't really understand why. Thank you. When Haley Stevens got into this, I know she was, as you were trying to explain earlier, she ran against Abdul El-Sayed. She was trying to become the candidate, wasn't she? She was. So they were they were both Democrats running earlier this year. He won more votes than she did. And and she's decided to extend her. Uh, differences or whatever you want to call it into the campaign when, when normally at this stage, you know, you would expect that, that a former, um, Candidate would have faded into the background or or would be standing on the stage raising her hands along with his and and urging him on again why she's decided to take this attack. I'm not exactly sure, but but I do think that he's had a very strong response, which is to say this is much less important than the the rising health care costs and the rising cost of living that. The millions of people in Michigan are facing, and that's what he would rather be talking about. You said at the beginning that you were impressed by Abdul Sayed. Is he your favoured candidate over the two, between the two as a Democrat? Because they're clearly very different types of Democrat, aren't they? Yes, they ran on different platforms. Thank you. This is something that's up for the people, the voters of Michigan, to decide. I vote elsewhere in the U.S., but for the voters of Michigan, I think they looked at what each of these candidates had to offer, and in the Democratic process, he won more votes than she did. Um, I think one of the things that to me in all of this is, is particularly telling is that, um, as I said, the, the state democratic party, the national democratic party have come out with statements in support of Abdul Al-Sayed. And but but more telling than that was Congresswoman Haley's sorry, Congresswoman Stevens, Haley Stevens, former staff chief of staff and and the rest of their staff came out. against her and in support of Abdul Sayed. Yeah, they found it was very anti-party, didn't they, as much as anything else? Yeah, I mean, they said, look, the chief of staff for her said, I've been working for this person for eight years, and I want to say today that our team is sorry to see this decision that she's made. We disagree with it, and we're stepping away from our... professional relationship with her. Is it possible that, I mean, she went to church apparently on Sunday yesterday with Mike Rogers, the Republican candidate. Is it likely so close to the poll that we'll see a full-blown defection here to the Republicans, which may seem even madder than what she's already done or odder than what she's already done, given how unpopular Trump is in the opinion polls? It's, can I? And I'm... I hesitate to use this word, but it is, to me, it's a little weird, this whole thing, because I was listening to part of an interview with her within the last 24 hours, I think it was from CNN or some place, and she was trying to say, I'm a Democrat, and I support the Democratic Party, and I just don't support Abdul El-Sayed, and I am supporting Mike Rogers. It's counterintuitive, isn't it, at the very least? It is, it's, as I say, it just, it strikes me as a bit weird, and when the interviewer pressed her and said, but you're not just voting for him, you're publicly coming out and you're campaigning for him, and you've done this all in a very, very public way, and she just seems to have drawn a blank, like she didn't really think about the fact that. What she was doing in public wasn't public somehow. I mean, do you see there's this disconnect somewhere that... Yeah, she could have just stayed quiet and gone to vote, couldn't she? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Can I ask you just finally, for now anyway, finally, because we'll see what happens in the next few days. Thank you, Nate. I end really where I began, a question about the Democratic Party itself. There are names being thrown out there for potential... presidential runs, and I'm sure some of them will be in it. I mean, some people want Abdul El-Sayed to run for presidency. Others want Gavin Newsom, perhaps more experienced. Um, John Ossoff is gaining traction, isn't he? ah AOC, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, James Tallarico. you Do you... They're from different branches of the party, aren't they? Different branches of thinking in the party very as to its direction of travel. Very different in some cases. What direction would you favour? much. Well, the great thing is we have a we have a process for you're a true Democrat, small d and big D. And these are great names. I'm thrilled that you've mentioned these names, because I think one of the reasons that we've got the momentum that we do is we have good candidates. And whether you look at Texas with Tallarico versus the Republican Paxton, I mean, Paxton is a guy who I'm sure you've heard it said repeatedly, Paxton was indicted by his own party. You know, I mean, the guy is... We've got big problems ethically and legally, and Tallarico, I think, is a good, strong candidate. And we. And that's the case in a lot of places where Democrats are running good, strong. But there's a definite line down the middle, isn't there, between those Democrats, think of somebody like Newsom, and somebody like AOC, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who is much to the left. She'd describe herself as a progressive, she'd have very particular and has expressed her views on America and Israel and that relationship. There are others in the party who would have a very different take, perhaps a more traditional Democrat take, a Biden-esque take. Is that going to be the dividing line? Beyond Wednesday. I don't think so, because, you know, we are, as you say, we're a Democratic Party. We're a big tent. We welcome lots of diversity of opinion. We don't pledge, you know, we don't pledge blinding fealty to any one person, only to the Constitution. So, you know, we welcome a diversity of opinion. In the presidential election process, as you know, I mean, you're going to be sick of hearing from Democrats abroad. Never. you know, of 2028, because there will be so much campaign news. A lot of the candidates that you're hearing about now will be running, I'm sure, and some won't. But the process starts it on a, it goes on a state by state process. And the reason I mentioned this is that we recently changed the, there used to be an agreement that Iowa and New Hampshire would always be the first two states to start the presidential selection process, with primaries held in their states, usually in like February of the election year. And that's changed now. So you're getting states that are much more diverse in terms of the kinds of voters and the demographics. So South Carolina is now among the first. States to be in to be voting. And that's about a six month process. It starts in February of 2028 and will run through June of 2028 or roughly. Is Kamala Harris still in the mix? She is. I saw a photo of her and. Gavin Newsom, of course, they're both Californians, standing on the stage in support of some other candidate running for Senate. The two of them together on stage for the first time just, I think, over the weekend. You thought ticket, did you? You, you. Sorry? Did you think ticket? There's a ticket. Possibly, possibly. But again, it's a process and it's for the voters in every state to decide, you know, who they want to run. And then the person that gets the most votes, the convention is held in July of 2028. And the person who has the most votes, you know, gets the nomination. And then they pick their running mate. So well, let's see what happens both Wednesday, tomorrow and Wednesday and further down the line as well. Thanks very much, John. Very good to talk to you. John Scardino, spokesperson for Democrats Abroad UK.