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5 min readAbdul El-Sayed Wins in Michigan — A Closer Look Than the Polls Suggested
Abdul El-Sayed defeated Representative Haley Stevens by a single point — 48.5% to 47.5% — to become the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Michigan, despite being outspent 11-to-1 and facing $60 million in outside spending, including $32 million from AIPAC. The race was far closer than pre-election polls had suggested, many of which showed El-Sayed leading by 10 to 19 points. As Dan Pfeiffer put it on the bonus episode of Pod Save America, "If the polls had been tied or shown Haley Stevens up a few points going into election day and Abdul won by one, this would be the shot heard around the world."
What the Polls Missed — and What the Coalition Looked Like
Michigan is notoriously difficult to poll. It lacks a well-regarded in-state pollster, and the most credible public poll — from EPIC — had El-Sayed up by 10 points just weeks before the primary. The best guess for the polling miss is that surveys oversampled highly engaged, college-educated voters — the very voters who overwhelmingly supported El-Sayed — and undersampled the rest of the Democratic primary electorate. Pfeiffer noted this is the opposite of the polling error that occurred in 2024 general election races, where highly engaged voters were undersampled.
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What you'll learn
- 1 (03:43) **Abdul El-Sayed Wins the Michigan Senate Primary** - Dan and John break down Abdul El-Sayed's victory over Haley Stevens by 1.5 points, despite being outspent 11-to-1 and taking on the entire Democratic establishment.
- 2 (06:15) **Why the Polls Were Wrong** - Dan and John analyze what caused the polling miss, noting Michigan's difficulty to poll and potential over-sampling of college-educated voters.
- 3 (08:43) **The Coalition That Won** - The hosts examine Abdul's winning coalition, which relied on young voters, college-educated voters, Arab American and Muslim voters, while struggling with working class and Black voters.
- 4 (10:37) **Was AIPAC a Net Positive or Negative for Haley Stevens?** - Dan and John debate whether AIPAC's massive spending helped or hurt Haley Stevens, and what this means for future Democratic candidates.
- 5 (14:53) **Unifying the Party After a Bruising Primary** - Dan and John assess how well Abdul and the Democratic establishment are coming together post-primary.
- 6 (20:18) **The General Election Begins: NRSC Attack Ad** - The hosts play the first Republican attack ad against Abdul, which combines "scary Muslim extremist" tropes with claims he'll raise taxes.
- 7 (24:05) **Abdul vs. Mike Rogers: The Character Challenge** - Dan and John discuss how Abdul can frame Mike Rogers, who voters remember as a more moderate, Trump-skeptical Republican.
+ Full timestamped outline available in the app
Guests on this episode
Show Notes
Abdul El-Sayed wins Michigan's democratic Senate nomination, defeating Rep. Haley Stevens by one point after a heated campaign about the future of the Democratic party.
Jon and Dan sit down for a bonus pod to talk about how El-Sayed overcame $60+ million in outside spending against him, make sense of the closer-than-expected results, and to preview the general election message against Mike Rogers, the Trump-endorsed Republican nominee.
Then, Senator Bernie Sanders, who endorsed El-Sayd's campaign on the day of its launch, talks to Jon about the future of the progressive movement.
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