Abdul El-Sayed walks with his wife, Sarah Jukaku, during the March of the Many, Sunday, Aug. 2, 2026, in Detroit. Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP
Since Abdul El-Sayed’s win earlier this month to become the Democratic nominee for Michigan’s US Senate seat, the right has ramped up its attacks on him, condemning his past comments as evidence of him being a “terrorist” and “radical Islamist” or a “jihadist sympathizer” who is “infiltrating from within”. But it has also targeted El-Sayed’s family—including his wife, Sarah Jukaku, a psychiatrist, and his half-sister, Eman Abdelhadi, a writer and assistant professor at the University of Chicago.
The same week as El-Sayed’s victory, President Trump posted a photo of himself and First Lady Melania Trump in formal attire next to a photo of the Senate nominee and his wife, who is wearing a hijab. “Two VERY DIFFERENT America’s [sic],” the post reads.
More recently, media outlets like Fox News and the New York Post have dug into Abdelhadi’s past, citing her arrest last fall on a felony charge for allegedly spitting on an Illinois state trooper during a protest outside Broadview ICE Detention Center in Chicago next to a mugshot, remarks on Israel and Palestine, and criticism of American holidays like July 4th and Thanksgiving.
“Abdul loves his sister and also disagrees with her on a number of political positions and the rhetoric she’s chosen to use,” Sophie Pollock, a spokesperson for the El-Sayed campaign, told Fox News in response to its story on Abdelhadi’s arrest. “But Abdul is the one on the ballot and his record of public service and his platform is what matters to voters here in Michigan.”
El-Sayed had already addressed much of the right’s criticisms—and increasing concern from establishment Democrats—previously, distancing himself from his past support for the “defund the police” movement along with other progressives candidates looking to come across as more presentable in the lead-up to the midterms.
But for the many on the right, backing down from past progressive rhetoric once, or even many times, will never be enough. It is those same folks on the right who dictate what is considered unacceptable and, in response, what many Democrats may worry is too radical or “woke” for potential voters leaning more toward the center.
Conservatives co-opted “woke” and its discourse. Democrats don’t have to fall in line with them.
