A prominent Michigan Democrat endorsed Republican Mike Rogers on Sunday, giving President Donald Trump’s Republicans an unexpected boost in a critical US Senate race two days before midterm elections that will decide control of Congress.
US Representative Haley Stevens, who lost the Michigan Democrats’ Senate primary to Abdul El-Sayed in a bitterly contested race, publicly backed Rogers and appeared with him at a Detroit church, threatening to worsen divisions in a state viewed as crucial to Democratic hopes of retaking the US Senate.
“I don’t belong in Abdul’s campaign,” Stevens said in a video posted to social media.
Hours later at a political rally in Iowa, Trump invited Stevens to join the Republican Party. He told reporters beforehand that he would reach out to her to thank her for the endorsement, which he called “a smart thing to do because El-Sayed would destroy our country.”
Thirty-five Senate seats and all 435 House of Representatives seats are on the ballot on Tuesday. Republicans hold narrow majorities in both chambers. Polls show Democrats are favored to win a majority of the House and are locked in a tight battle for control of the Senate, where the outcome likely will rest with a handful of states, including Michigan and Alaska.
If Democrats take control of the House or Senate, they could block Trump’s legislative agenda for his final two years in office and launch investigations of an administration that has so far faced largely compliant Republican majorities. The White House has been preparing to implement portions of Trump’s agenda without the aid of Congress.
MICHIGAN RIFT
Stevens’ endorsement of Rogers came on the day she was scheduled to appear with El-Sayed in a show of party unity. But the planned event unraveled after Stevens called on El-Sayed to condemn an outside group’s ad that she said blames Israel for high grocery prices.
“We can’t stand with hate,” Stevens told reporters on Sunday, standing alongside Rogers after the church service.
El-Sayed’s campaign recently asked Stevens to skip his events through Election Day so as “not to distract from the central issues of the campaign,” a person familiar with the matter said.
Republicans sought to capitalize on Stevens’ move. “This is courage in politics in America today,” Rogers said. “When you see a party, and at least a sliver of the party, veering off into the virulent hate that they have been spewing toward a group of people, it gets dangerous.”
Later on Sunday at the Iowa rally, Trump repeated false claims that El-Sayed is a “jihadist” – attacks that fit a broader pattern of inflammatory rhetoric from Trump and other Republicans targeting Arab Americans and Muslims.
El-Sayed, who has been subjected to a campaign of racist and Islamophobic attacks, has rejected such accusations and called questions about his loyalty to the United States “shameful.”
He declined to directly address Stevens’ endorsement on Sunday, saying he was focused on other issues.
The move appeared to have little effect on some early voters in Michigan, where El-Sayed has a nearly 4-point lead over Rogers, according to the RealClearPolling estimate.
“Haley Stevens is a traitor,” said Pamela Johnson, 72, after casting her ballot for El-Sayed in Warren, a Detroit suburb.
David Kolar, a 32-year-old elementary teacher, said Stevens’ endorsement “seemed like a last-second distraction.” He said he voted for El-Sayed because of his support for universal government-funded healthcare.
A number of Stevens’ congressional staff resigned over the endorsement, according to reports from CNN and the Hill.
Stevens’ longtime chief of staff, Justin German, could not immediately be reached to verify the reports, which quoted a statement from him saying, “as of this morning, many members of our team have resigned, including myself.” The statement described him as “shocked and heartbroken” by Stevens’ endorsement.
ALASKA INTERVENTION FALTERS
Also on Sunday, the Trump administration’s attempt to intervene in Alaska’s Senate race faltered when a federal judge dismissed the US Justice Department’s lawsuit seeking to block certification of the results if Republican incumbent Senator Dan S. Sullivan narrowly loses.
The Justice Department argued voters may be confused by the presence of a challenger named Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. on the same ballot.
The issue has roiled the campaign over the last several days after the New York Times reported that Democrat Mary Peltola’s campaign was involved in recruiting Daniel J. Sullivan Jr. into the race as a spoiler.
The senator said on Sunday he would accept the results of Tuesday’s election even as the Trump administration presses a criminal investigation into the issue. But Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy, a Republican, has suggested he may not certify a victory by Peltola, and the incumbent Sullivan declined to say whether he would support efforts to refuse certification.
He joined his party colleagues in accusing the other Sullivan of trying to confuse voters with his similar name.
“They got the decoy guy on the ballot,” the senator told CNN’s “State of the Union” program. “I’m sure I’m going to lose a lot of votes to that trickery. So what I say to Alaskans is, ‘Don’t let them get away with the tricks.'”
Peltola has denied involvement, and Sullivan Jr. has denied coordinating with Peltola’s campaign.
(Reporting by Andrew Goudsward, Doina Chiacu and David Morgan )
