Abdul El-Sayed stood in front of Michigan farmers, next to Debbie Stabenow, and decided the safest topic to bridge the political aisle was whether the University of Michigan can ever win a football game without cheating. He said it with a chuckle. The room offered a couple of awkward laughs. The rest of the state did not.
According to OutKick, the Democrat Senate nominee was urging the small audience not to “indict” neighbors who “made a different political choice” in the last election. Talk about the weather, he suggested, or ask “Will (the University of) Michigan ever win a football game without cheating.” He delivered the line as a Wolverine. That detail only made it worse.
Michigan does not treat its football program as a casual punchline. The Wolverines are woven into Saturdays, family arguments, and the state’s sense of itself. El-Sayed is a University of Michigan graduate and a former high-school captain at Andover. He has also spent years describing the sport in language that sounds like a sociology seminar.
In a 2021 essay responding to Jon Gruden, he wrote that “the toxic masculinity at the heart of America’s most popular sport — and men’s sports culture more generally — is way deeper than a few emails.”
Separate remarks linked the ethos of football to Manifest Destiny, the destruction of Native communities, and the transatlantic slave trade. He has questioned whether the game can ever be “ethical and safe.” Then he ran for office and started posting about the Lions.
The pattern is familiar. Criticize the culture when the audience is progressive. Soften the language when the audience is Michigan. Then let the real opinion slip out in front of the wrong room.
But those things which proceed out of the mouth come forth from the heart; and they defile the man.
Dave Portnoy, a Michigan superfan who has put real money behind the program, watched the clip and wrote, “This guy really is a terrorist.” El-Sayed’s opponent, Mike Rogers, quoted the post and added that Portnoy “is exactly right.” The National Republican Senatorial Committee amplified it. Rogers’s campaign later framed the joke as parroting Ohio State talking points. That is the rivalry talking. The political damage is real either way.
The timing did not help. Michigan is in the middle of a rocky season under new coach Kyle Whittingham, coming off losses to Iowa and Minnesota. An earlier win over Western Michigan arrived via a Hail Mary after a disputed extra second.
The program still carries the shadow of the Connor Stalions sign-stealing operation that accompanied the 2023 national title. Rival fans have called that team cheaters for years. A Senate candidate from Ann Arbor repeating the charge, even as a joke, hands those rivals a free clip and hands his own voters a reason to stay home.
El-Sayed narrowly won the Democratic primary over Haley Stevens. He is running as a progressive who wants Medicare for All and tighter rules on campaign money. Michigan voters already know his background as a public-health official and Rhodes Scholar. What many of them also know is that autumn Saturdays matter more than another lecture on toxic masculinity. Portnoy’s reaction and Rogers’s agreement turned a throwaway line into a state-wide reminder that the nominee still views one of the state’s defining institutions with open disdain.
Candidates lose votes for far less. El-Sayed’s own history of scrubbing old posts and videos already raised questions about what he wants voters to see. This clip required no excavation. He said it on camera, as a Wolverine, while asking farmers to reach across the aisle. The internet answered with the usual mix of outrage and mockery. Some Michigan alums called the remark unforgivable. Others simply said he lost votes.
Three weeks remain before Election Day. Rogers has already leaned into the football culture gap. Trump said Rogers “completely obliterated” El-Sayed in their debate. Another self-inflicted wound on the sport that binds much of the state does not close that gap.
Someone should have told El-Sayed that Michigan football is not a safe topic for a progressive Senate candidate who has spent years explaining why the game is rotten. The farmers heard the joke. So did everyone else.
