Forty-five minutes into the Michigan Senate debate, Republican Mike Rogers had already smeared Democratic frontrunner Abdul El-Sayed with five fact-free references to the Muslim Brotherhood, four mentions of Hamas, another four call-outs to Hamas, and exactly zero mentions of his mentor and patron, Donald Trump. The former congressman projected all the grace of an increasingly red and flustered Florida time-share salesman knowing he is not closing the deal with the nice, elderly couple from Saginaw.
The chaotic debate — at one point the moderator glumly said he’d like to be included in the conversation — eventually moved on to the always prying eyes of Flock cameras. El-Sayed offered that, unlike Rogers, he believed your privacy could be violated even if you didn’t know your privacy had been violated and advocated for federal regulations. Rogers went a different way. He defended their utility in fighting terrorism and then turned ever so slightly toward El-Sayed.
“Why would that bother you?” said Rogers. And then he said the quiet part out loud. “Well, if you have somebody in your family that might be on the watch list.”
El-Sayed smiled or winced; it was hard to tell. He glared at Rogers.
“Go ahead and say it, you’ve been tiptoeing around it.”
Alas, Rogers didn’t say it. He didn’t say Dr. Abdul El-Sayed – high school football star and overly proud University of Michigan graduate – was the spiritual son of Osama Bin-Laden sent by Allah to detonate the White House on his first visit.
But it was heavily implied.
Rogers had been dodging debate opportunities with the Oxford-educated El-Sayed for a month. It turns out Rogers’ cowardice in the defense of his dignity was no vice. Last night in Grand Rapids, El-Sayed spoke in complete sentences with actual coherent thoughts about Medicare for All, a billionaire tax, and no military aid for foreign countries. He often tight roped the line between confidence and smugness, a chronic weakness in his public persona. (Maybe you must be smug when your opponent is linking you without proof to every modern terrorist gang except the Ninja Turtles and Boko Haram.)
Rogers came across as all the Biffs — Biff from Back To The Future, Biff from Death of a Salesman — a bully/loser archetype who panicked the first time El-Sayed punched him in the mouth. (Verbally of course, even if it did seem on a couple of occasions that the discussion was about to go full MMA.)
El-Sayed was asked early if he was in favor of a temporary suspension of the federal gas tax. He said yes and then clobbered Rogers.
“There is one thing that is actually causing this — it’s the war in Iran, a war that has been cheer-led by my opponent since the beginning. He called it a win-win. I don’t know about you, but when I go to the gas tank, I don’t feel like I’m winning. I don’t feel like our country is winning. Seven months on, eight months on, how long is this going to last? We can do so much better.”
Rogers offered some arcane policy ideas that might bring down fuel prices, but he was forced to admit the obvious about the Iranian conflict.
“I do believe it’s going to come to an end,” said Rogers in a downcast voice. “We need it to come to an end.”
In recent days, Rogers has done U-turns on the Iranian war and on the tariff war with Canada, two pillars of Trump’s second term. He even filmed a cringe commercial where he said there was nothing better he liked to do than drink a Labatt’s and watch the Red Wings play Canada’s national sport. (As a former Michiganian, I can say maybe that happens across the Gordie Howe Bridge in Windsor, but I’ve never seen Labatt’s chugging in a Detroit or Flint sports bar.)
All Rogers had to sell was fear, not that fear should ever be underestimated in Michigan or for that matter America. El-Sayed’s narrow win in the Democratic primary after leading by double digits in most polls suggest that the $70 million that AIPAC dropped on him caused a lot of fear and nearly cost him the race. Still, Roger’s scare tactics seemed like they were from an older era, say Sacco and Vanzetti, when even a slightly darker shade of pale could disqualify you from public life or even public existence. El-Sayed is a Michigan born Egyptian American and a Muslim and that, apparently, is different enough that Rogers felt free to rage about El-Sayed’s family owning property in Egypt, the land of his father, and the United Arab Emirates as if they were Afghanistan caves after 9/11 rather than countries that are staunch allies of the United States.
Eventually, a desperate Rogers resorted to throwing a bunch of baddies into a word salad and called El-Sayed a con man.
“He has taken money from groups associated in support of the Muslim Brotherhood,” said Rogers. “He has taken money from individuals on his campaign who openly support Hamas, Hezbollah, Al Qaeda. He’s taken money from the George Soros family. What we found out is that this thing goes way back. Apparently, they paid for his education in Columbia.”
I was genuinely confused at this point. Did Hezbollah pay for his education at Columbia or was it George Soros? But how could it be Soros because he’s Jewish and Rogers kept implying that El-Sayed hates Jews because he is against arming foreign powers whether it be Israel or his father’s Egypt.
I need a handful of Advil.
Occasionally, El-Sayed tried to turn the debate from a rock fight to Schoolhouse Rock. “He wants to make this about him or me, but the question is about you,” said El-Sayed. “Can you afford your gas? Can you afford your groceries under this guy who’s going to rubber stamp everything Donald Trump tells him to rubber stamp? You’re going to continue to pay way more out the nose because he works for corporations and Donald Trump.”
Yes, El-Sayed’s political rhetoric was the equivalent of Safeway brand vanilla ice cream, but it provided a welcome contrast to Rogers who went on full tilt in his closing remarks.
“We cannot afford Abdul, and we cannot risk his ideology,” said Rogers beginning a verbal guitar solo with no idea of where it was going to end. “Think about what he’s proposing-the largest, most massive tax increase in history, taking over your private health insurance and giving it to the government. Huge increases in your energy costs. I’m Mike Rogers, United States Army officer, FBI agent. Don’t listen to this guy.”
Roger was now the guy on the street corner with a 40 that everyone pretends not to see or hear. The debate mercifully ended and El-Sayed did what every smart guy does when exiting the premises at the same time as a belligerent fool. He paused and waited for Rogers to clear the area.
Then El-Sayed smiled and exited stage right.
