Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is running a six-figure Fox News and Newsmax ad that leans on conservative praise, Republicans call the pitch desperation in a toss-up Michigan race.
Newsweek reported that El-Sayed released a new spot titled “Red Hat” aimed squarely at Trump and MAGA audiences in the closing stretch of Michigan’s open U.S. Senate race.
The ad buy runs exclusively on Fox News and Newsmax through Election Day on November 3. It is a six-figure push, timed as statewide early in-person voting began.
El-Sayed opens by telling viewers they already share ground. Then the spot cuts to clips of conservative personalities praising him, or slamming his Republican opponent, former Rep. Mike Rogers.
In the ad, El-Sayed introduces himself and claims Washington elites spent millions trying to blame him for other people’s words.
“The DC elites spent millions trying to blame me for things other people said. But we agree on a lot.”
He lists themes familiar to right-leaning voters: a “corrupt swamp,” big corporations and elites raising costs, releasing the Epstein files, free speech under attack, Make America Healthy Again, ending wasteful overseas wars, and stopping bad trade deals.
“Don't wanna take my word for it? How about some folks you know a little bit better?”
The montage that follows features Jesse Watters, Saagar Enjeti, Lara Trump, Tucker Carlson, Lidia Curanaj, and Rep. Nancy Mace.
Watters says voters “gotta respect Abdul, because he beat the machine.” Enjeti calls the campaign “America First.” Lara Trump calls him “a good-looking guy” and “a great speaker.” Curanaj calls him “very charismatic.” Carlson’s clip is blunt about the Republican: “I wouldn't vote for Mike Rogers at gunpoint.”
El-Sayed closes the spot with a Michigan-first line and his approval.
“I approve this message, because for me, it's Michigan First, and we can agree on that.”
Spokesperson Cole Wozniak framed the buy as outreach, not a stunt. He said El-Sayed is “not taking a single voter for granted” and that the blitz is part of an attempt “to win on November 3rd.”
Wozniak also pointed to El-Sayed’s Fox News appearances and policy agendas aimed at MAHA voters and rural Michiganders, the same audiences most likely to know the hosts featured in the ad.
Newsweek sought comment from Rogers’ campaign and the White House on the ad. No responses were reported in that account.
Republican National Committee National Press Secretary Natalie Baldassarre answered on Saturday with a hard dismissal.
“This ad is nothing more than a pathetic act of desperation from someone whose coalition is abandoning him left and right over his terrorist ties and extremist views.”
El-Sayed has denied allegations tying him to terrorist organizations. The Newsweek report did not detail the full claims or the full text of his denial beyond that denial itself.
The race is rated a Toss Up by the Cook Political Report. Republicans have not won a U.S. Senate election in Michigan since 1994. The seat is open because Democratic Sen. Gary Peters is retiring. Democrats need a net gain of four seats to take Senate control from the current 53-47 Republican majority.
Rogers carries President Donald Trump’s endorsement. In 2024, Rogers came within fewer than 20,000 votes of Democrat Elissa Slotkin in the state’s other Senate race. Trump carried Michigan that year after the state backed Joe Biden in 2020.
The outreach ad sat beside sharper lines at the final Senate debate on Wednesday. El-Sayed told Rogers he should be embarrassed that he “cannot win this race without Trump coming here and stumping for you.”
He also framed MAGA rhetoric as distraction.
“The thing about MAGA is whenever they're talking, they are trying to distract you. They're going to use buzzwords, and I hope y'all can play bingo at home.”
That is a different register from the “we agree on a lot” pitch running on Fox News and Newsmax.
On Saturday, the first day of statewide early in-person voting, former President Barack Obama campaigned in Detroit with El-Sayed and Democratic gubernatorial nominee Jocelyn Benson, Michigan’s secretary of state.
Obama defended El-Sayed against Republican attacks on patriotism and cast the fight as familiar.
“We have seen this movie before. I starred in it...This stuff didn't work on me. Not in Michigan. It's not going to work on Abdul.”
El-Sayed had criticized Obama years earlier. After Obama’s 2012 reelection, he wrote in The Huffington Post that the result was “the rock we chose over the hard place,” faulting the administration on war, civil liberties, and deportations. On NBC’s Meet the Press earlier this month, he softened that record: he was “younger” and “angry about circumstances,” and said Obama “was handed a really difficult set of circumstances, and he did his best.”
Trump was due in Port Huron on Sunday around 3 p.m. at McMorran Place to rally for Rogers.
Michigan voters are hearing two closing messages from the same Democrat: borrowed conservative applause on Fox and Newsmax, and MAGA-as-distraction on the debate stage. Records, votes, and follow-through still decide who meant it.
