# Senate races 2026 **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [January 28, 2025, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534 "2025-01-28T15:04:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 61
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2026, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1202 "2026-11-01T23:48:59Z")
They’re Nazis. Fuck 'em. Nazi defenders are Nazis. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2026, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1203 "2026-11-01T23:49:50Z")
Got any reputable cites? ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2026, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1204 "2026-11-01T23:51:00Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > > _ **Tucker Carlson:** _ _I wouldn’t vote for Mike Rogers at gunpoint._ > > That is NOT an “endorsement”. It only says Carlson does not like Rogers. The term “endorsement” has a specific political meaning. It says that he dislikes Rogers more than he dislikes El Sayed. I don’t think that’s something to be proud of. As someone mentioned in another thread, being disliked by Tucker Carlson is one of the only things Rogers has going for him. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2026, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1205 "2026-11-01T23:51:47Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > I think it’s pretty disturbing who he has this kind of heat for and who he doesn’t. And there have been plenty of pro-Rogers ads that call Abdul a terrorist, as well as other racist and islamaphobic things, not to mention what Trump has said about him. I think it’s pretty disturbing who Haley has the heat for and who she doesn’t. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2026, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1206 "2026-11-01T23:54:01Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Got any reputable cites? > **[U.S. Senate candidate Rogers taps students who defended Hitler group chat and...](https://www.metrotimes.com/news/u-s-senate-candidate-rogers-taps-students-who-defended-hitler-group-chat-and-spread-misogynistic-comments/)** > > U.S. Senate candidate Mike Rogers’s newly announced student outreach team includes a member who complained about women in politics and another who defended a leaked Young Republicans group chat filled with praise for Hitler, gas chamber jokes, racial... ---
**Author:** ![DeadTreasSecretaries](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/deadtreassecretaries/32/4817_2.png) [@DeadTreasSecretaries](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DeadTreasSecretaries)\ **Post date:** [November 1, 2026, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1207 "2026-11-01T23:55:03Z")
A pretty big issue that unites both democratic and swing voters is opposition to Trump’s war in Iran. Catlson happens to be on the right sidevof that. It takes significantly more principle than I have to not use that wedge issue to win elections against a fascist movement. I don’t want to be the most pricipled person in alligator alcatraz. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1208 "2026-11-02T00:01:10Z")
> [@Happy\_Lendervedder](#): > > And there have been plenty of pro-Rogers ads that call Abdul a terrorist, as well as other racist and islamaphobic things, not to mention what Trump has said about him. Who the hell is defending Rogers here? > [@Happy\_Lendervedder](#): > > I think it’s pretty disturbing who Haley has the heat for and who she doesn’t I’m pretty sure that all of us who say we understand where she’s coming from also said that she’s making a mistake. Correct me if I’m wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1209 "2026-11-02T00:04:22Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Who the fuck is defending Rogers here? Haley Stevens. Oh yeah, you’re all “She’s making a mistake, but…” No, she’s throwing herself in with racists 100% and you’re still defending her and attacking El Sayed for not meeting her stupid demands. She’s coming from a position of opportunism, selfishness and racism. Nothing more. ---
**Author:** ![bordelond](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bordelond/32/150_2.png) [@bordelond](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bordelond)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1210 "2026-11-02T00:06:36Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > Abdul El Sayed made some very forceful statements condemning Stevens. Imagine if he could have been this decisive when distancing himself from Hasan Piker, or from this anti-Semitic ad. We probably wouldn’t be in this mess. > > I think it’s pretty disturbing who he has this kind of heat for and who he doesn’t. Stevens came at El-Sayed personally. From the outside, it appears not much more complicated than that. Regarding the Rebellion PAC/Stevens kerfluffle: any consideration that it could well have been an operation? “_Make’em deny it!_”, “_Make’em denounce it!”_, and “_Make’em not rule it out!_” are all apples on the same propaganda tree. And giving a strong denouncement to the first offense in line is not necessarily a safe PR play because then you must respond in kind to all the rest that will be lined up at your feet. All of them. Tirelessly. If you ever had a message or identity of your own, good luck getting it out after falling for that “_denounce it now!_” stunt. El-Sayed’s response has been the correct one as a political calculation. He wasn’t getting 100% of the votes anyway. He also couldn’t stop a last-gasp Rogers-Stevens attack from siphoning off a small number of votes (but only a small number, as it turns out). But what El-Sayed could do was mitigate the damage—maybe lose 2,000 votes instead of 8,000 (thin-air numbers). ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1211 "2026-11-02T00:11:16Z")
> [@Happy\_Lendervedder](#): > > No, she’s throwing herself in with racists 100% and you’re still defending her and attacking El Sayed for not meeting her stupid demands. What we are telling you is that a lot of people in the Jewish community don’t consider her demands stupid at all. We are also telling you that even more troubling than Abdul El Sayed’s own positions is the way that the rest of the party is minimizing our concerns. @DSeid made a very excellent post about it in the “stupid liberal idea of the day” thread, but I don’t want to quote it without his permission because it was originally posted in a Pit thread. Instead, I will link this article that someone in a lefty Jewish discord I am in posted: > **[Abdul El-Sayed’s Closing Message to Jewish Voters: Fuck You.](https://jewthhq.substack.com/p/abdul-el-sayeds-closing-message-to)** > > The Democratic campaign in Michigan ends how it started, with all it entails for Jewish voters. > [@](#): > > Instead, El-Sayed and his supporters have spent weeks gaslighting Jewish voters and lecturing them on what they should and should not feel. Look, they say, he did condemn antisemitism multiple times! But those same leftists conceptualized one of the most important ideas in politics — that actions speak louder than words. And if they implemented that notion honestly, they would soon realize that Abdul El-Sayed’s actions do not match his words, however sweet and unifying as they may sound. > [@](#): > > If El-Sayed condemned antisemitism, he wouldn’t boast about the support he got from a man who was fired from Fox News (!) for being too extreme; a man who platformed Holocaust deniers (Nick Fuentes, Darryl Cooper) and was condemned by Yad Vashem; a man who said that the war in Iran was driven by a Jewish plot to destroy Islamic holy sites on the Temple Mount; a man who implied that Israel was behind 9/11 — and when pressed on that support, he wouldn’t double down and instead fire at the critics who are skeptical about this misplaced pride. > [@](#): > > I want to submit one of my favorite tests that I strive to apply as much as I can when in doubt. It can be summarized in one question: would I accept this if it came from a Republican? And it works for everyone: if you are, in fact, a Republican, it also is useful to wonder if what you take from Trump, Vance, and other Republican candidates, you would also have no issue with if it were a Democrat. I did not invent this test, but I call it the Switcheroo Test. > […] > Apply the Switcheroo Test: if El-Sayed had cut this exact ad touting Carlson’s support in 2021, every person quoted above would have torched him for it. The reason they’re tolerating and defending it now isn’t because Carlson has moderated, it’s because he started being dangerous about a different group of people that they don’t care about. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1212 "2026-11-02T00:12:55Z")
> [@bordelond](#): > > Regarding the Rebellion PAC/Stevens kerfluffle: any consideration that it could well have been an operation? “_Make’em deny it!_”, “_Make’em denounce it!”_, and “_Make’em not rule it out!_” are all apples on the same propaganda tree As Stevens said in the first statement she made on the topic - the issue is that El Sayed said “I didn’t make that ad”, which is true, but he didn’t say that he disagrees with it, and in fact the message at the very least rhymes with his own messaging. That’s a problem for me and for many other people. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1213 "2026-11-02T00:34:24Z")
Nevermind ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1214 "2026-11-02T00:36:59Z")
No, read the article. The guy is a Nazi defender, and says extremist things himself. And the Rogers campaign defended having him on the team. ---
**Author:** ![Procrustus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/procrustus/32/2994_2.png) [@Procrustus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Procrustus)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1215 "2026-11-02T00:37:01Z")
If I’m understanding correctly (and I’ll concede I may be missing something), the complaint against El-Sayed is that while he has condemned antisemitism, he has not condemned or distanced himself sufficiently from other people who are considered antisemitic. It’s not his job to attack all individual antisemitic people. A general condemnation of antisemitism seems sufficient. Or at least close enough for politics. (few politicians say everything the way I would prefer, and I don’t expect that to change). > “Antisemitism is a scourge, and we need to address it in all its forms. It has no place in our communities. Ever. Full stop.” In response to Piker saying something stupid, he said: > “Comparing Jewish Michiganders to the Ku Klux Klan is utterly inappropriate and flat-out wrong.” I had never heard of Piker until a few days ago. He seems like a complete ass, among other things. I doubt El-Sayed needs his support. I don’t know why he appeared with Piker at a campaign event. El-Sayed has tried to distance himself from Piker in the general election. Not enough in my opinion, but that hardly indicates that El-Sayed is antisemitic. Nor do I draw that conclusion from his criticisms of Isreal or AIPAC (both of which align pretty well with my own views, as a _very_ secular Jewish American). People tend to make up their minds, and then search for facts that fit their world view. Maybe I’m doing that because I like this guy and find him an effective and committed public servant. Maybe others who don’t like him are coming up with excuses to justify _their_ opinions. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1216 "2026-11-02T00:39:01Z")
Does there exist a nonzero number of people for whom that’s true? Undoubtedly. But they don’t speak for all Jews, any more than Michigan Jews for Democracy do. How many of them are there? Of those, how many would have distrusted El-Sayed no matter what he said about this ad? Or would have eventually come to a position of distrust after the 7392nd statement made by some random nobody that El-Sayed didn’t stoop to respond to? Because there are definitely plenty of other people who aren’t El-Sayed who say hateful things that people like Stevens could call on him to renounce. There’s so many, in fact, that even if he spent 24 hours a day on renouncing all of them, he’d never get to the end of the list. > [@Babale](#): > > and in fact the message at the very least rhymes with his own messaging. This is the one and only thing that matters, here. What is El-Sayed’s own actual messaging? If he’s said something that’s problematic, share that, and we can debate that. If he hasn’t, then stop saying that he has. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1217 "2026-11-02T00:40:58Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > This is the one and only thing that matters, here. What is El-Sayed’s own actual messaging? If he’s said something that’s problematic, share that, and we can debate that. If he hasn’t, then stop saying that he has. From the article I linked earlier: > [@](#): > > Second, his own record: beyond Piker, Abdul El-Sayed has himself used rhetoric that has sparked concerns and alarmed Jewish leaders. As is well established but worth repeating, criticizing Israel’s government is perfectly fair, and Israelis do it themselves as we saw this week at the ballot box. But blaming a state or a people for Americans’ hardships is bigotry, and El-Sayed has repeatedly crossed that line. The morning after his primary win, he called Israel “bloodthirsty,” explicitly going beyond Netanyahu’s government; this language brushes against blood-libel tropes while indicting the state as a whole. In October he called Israel “not actually our friend,” comparing it to a friend who takes your kids’ money and drags them into fights, thereby blaming Israel for America’s wars and spending. Days earlier, he’d reiterated he wouldn’t support even defensive weapons for Israel under attack. When Rebellion PAC ran an antisemitic ad blaming Israel for US inflation, he declined to condemn it, offering only a tepid distancing of his own campaign. He touted Tucker Carlson’s endorsement in a statewide ad, despite Carlson’s record of platforming Holocaust denial and making his own antisemitic remarks. He has repeatedly suggested aid to Israel comes at the expense of American schools and healthcare, and has invoked AIPAC as the villain “sending” money abroad “rather than investing” it at home. One campaign text even urged voters to “stand with Abdul against Israel,” asking Jewish Michiganders to choose between their candidate and their families, and echoing the erstwhile claim that Israel “drags us into its wars.” ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1218 "2026-11-02T00:43:00Z")
Per the cite- > [@Babale](#): > > He touted Tucker Carlson’s endorsement in a statewide ad, As has been pointed out, Carlson in no way “endorsed” El-Sayed . ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1219 "2026-11-02T00:44:22Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > From the article I linked earlier: None of that is remotely antisemitic (and some of it is false). Is that really the best they’ve got? ---
**Author:** ![Atamasama](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/atamasama/32/12961_2.png) [@Atamasama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Atamasama)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1220 "2026-11-02T00:45:34Z")
People who can’t distinguish between Jewish people and the state of Israel are never going to be reached. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [November 2, 2026, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534/1221 "2026-11-02T00:45:43Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > As has been pointed out, Carlson in no way “endorsed” El-Sayed . As I said above: > [@Babale](#): > > Technically it’s not an endorsement from Carlson, he’s just saying that he wouldn’t vote for Rogers at gunpoint. **Which, you know, is not an endorsement in the same way that the Cenk ad was not antisemitic.** > [@Babale](#): > > It says that he dislikes Rogers more than he dislikes El Sayed. I don’t think that’s something to be proud of. As someone mentioned in another thread, being disliked by Tucker Carlson is one of the only things Rogers has going for him. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534.md?page=60) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/senate-races-2026/1013534.md?page=62)