El-Sayed won 50% of Jewish vote but underperformed compared to other Democrats, poll finds
98% of Michigan Jewish Democrats who opposed senator-elect say they would have likely voted for a different Democratic candidate, according to The Jewish Majority's survey
A poll released on Friday found that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed received around half of the Jewish vote, underperforming other Democrats in the US midterms.
El-Sayed won the race earlier this month — the first Muslim elected to the US Senate — as part of the Democrats’ crushing nationwide performance against Republicans.
His candidacy roiled Michigan’s Jews due to his initial equivocation about an attempted terrorist attack on a synagogue near Detroit, his anti-Zionism and hostility toward Israel, and his partnership with the incendiary anti-Israel streamer Hasan Piker, among other issues.
Most American Jews are Democrats, and his race had been seen as crucial to the party winning control of the Senate, putting many Jewish voters in a bind.
The poll, by The Jewish Majority research group, found that 50 percent of Jewish voters backed El-Sayed, 43% voted for Republican Mike Rogers, 4% left the Senate race blank and 3% chose another candidate.
By comparison, in Michigan’s gubernatorial race, Democratic candidate Jocelyn Benson won 69% of the Jewish vote, outpacing El-Sayed by 19 percentage points, according to the survey.
For respondents who self-identified as Democrats or Democratic-leaning, 93% supported Benson and 70% El-Sayed, a 23-point gap.
The survey found that 67% of respondents identified as Democrat or leaned Democrat.
The pollsters asked respondents about their votes in the 2024 elections in Michigan, finding that El-Sayed underperformed the Democratic candidates who ran in those races.
In 2024, 75% of the respondents said they had voted for the Democratic Senate candidate, Elissa Slotkin, and 21% for Rogers.
For the 2024 presidential election, 69% voted for Democrat Kamala Harris, and 28% for Republican Donald Trump.
In March, a terrorist attempted to attack Temple Israel, a prominent congregation in West Bloomfield, near Detroit. After the attack, in reference to the terrorist, El-Sayed said, “Hurt people hurt people.” He later apologized “if my statement caused pain.”
West Bloomfield is in Oakland County, a center of Jewish life in Michigan. In the county, Rogers won the Jewish vote with 52%, while 39% voted for El-Sayed, the poll found.
The survey found that 98% of Michigan Jewish Democrats who opposed El-Sayed said they would have likely voted for a different Democratic candidate.
For the Democrats who rejected El-Sayed, 87% cited concerns about antisemitism, 84% his comments after the Temple Israel attack, 83% his positions on Israel, and 82% his treatment of the Jewish community.
The research surveyed 883 Michigan Jewish voters and had a margin of error of 3.9 percentage points.
The Mercury Public Affairs research firm conducted the poll on behalf of the Jewish Majority. The study combined an early-voter survey from earlier this month with a follow-up round of interviews that finished on Tuesday.