A tense exchange between Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed and a Republican operative at a campaign town hall has reignited scrutiny of alleged ties between his family and the Muslim Brotherhood.
The confrontation began when Tommy Teepell, a former aide to Senator Josh Hawley, asked El-Sayed whether he would denounce the Muslim Brotherhood.
El-Sayed quickly answered, “Sure. Yeah, absolutely,” before speaking at length. He suggested that Teepell’s question was rooted in assumptions about him because he is Muslim.
During the exchange, El-Sayed compared his experience to that of President John F. Kennedy, the nation’s first Catholic president.
Drawing a parallel with his own campaign, El-Sayed said he was not seeking office to become a “Muslim senator,” but to serve in the U.S. Senate as a person who happens to be Muslim.
“I think it’s you who needs to understand the Constitution, not me,” El-Sayed told Teepell.
The argument soon became a major flashpoint in the race, with CBS News chief legal correspondent Jan Crawford appearing to side with Teepell in a post that was later deleted from X.
“Tommy, thank you. I had to watch this twice to catch Dr. Abdul El-Sayed’s nanosecond ‘yeah absolutely’ response,” Crawford wrote.
“I think it’s you who needs to understand the Constitution, not me,” El-Sayed said while concluding his exchange with a campaign attendee who questioned why he had not denounced the Muslim Brotherhood.
El-Sayed compared his candidacy with that of President JFK, the first Catholic president, saying he was not running to be a Muslim senator but to serve in the U.S. Senate as someone who happens to be Muslim.
The exchange quickly became a flashpoint in the race, with CBS News chief legal correspondent Jan Crawford siding with Tommy in a post that was later deleted from X.
“His subsequent uninterrupted three-minute diatribe proving your exact point is the kind of spectacular self-own most people only dream about triggering. Congrats.”
Crawford deleted the post following backlash and later apologized, acknowledging that it violated CBS News standards. Some observers speculated that the message may have been intended as a direct message to Teepell.
It later emerged that CBS head Bari Weiss had personally urged reporters to investigate El-Sayed’s background.
The viral confrontation, which has drawn more than 13 million views on X, has also renewed attention on older social media posts by El-Sayed’s half-sister, Eman Abdelhadi, concerning alleged historical links between their family and the Muslim Brotherhood.
In posts from 2012 and 2013, Abdelhadi discussed relatives in Egypt who supported the organization and described her mother’s alleged activism as a college student in the early 1970s.
In one 2012 post, she wrote, “My family has long been MB,” using an abbreviation for the Muslim Brotherhood.
In another post from the same day, she referred to her mother’s “activism in the Muslim Brotherhood during the early 70s while she was in college.”
Abdelhadi wrote in 2013 that she did not support the organization, but said some relatives had been jailed because of their membership.
CONTINUE READING: New York Drops Part of Native American Logo Ban in Massapequa Case
El-Sayed’s Republican opponent, Mike Rogers, has focused on the resurfaced posts, making the alleged Muslim Brotherhood connections a central part of his attacks as he repeatedly challenges El-Sayed over his background and national-security views.
El-Sayed’s Republican opponent, Mike Rogers, has seized on El- Sayed’s half-sister’s resurfaced Muslim Brotherhood posts as a central line of attack against El-Sayed throughout his campaign
Just this past Thursday, Trump again reiterated his accusations of El-Sayed’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood in a video, urging voters to support Rogers
El-Sayed pictured with his stepmother, Jacqueline. He said he was raised by his father, Mohamed and his stepmother after his parents divorced when he was three
Rogers even released a campaign ad highlighting the half-sister’s posts and claimed the Democrat had a history of supporting the organization.
President Trump has also repeatedly claimed El-Sayed is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, calling El-Sayed ‘a Muslim radical … a Muslim Brotherhood member.’
‘All you have to do is look at his past correspondence, and we cannot take a chance on having this guy be in the United States Senate.’
El-Sayed has repeatedly rejected the allegations.
During an interview with NBC News’ Tom Llamas last week, Llamas questioned him about his alleged family ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, to which he responded, ‘I have no ties. We have no ties.’
He also said he had never discussed his mother’s alleged activism with her, explaining that he was raised by his father Mohamed and stepmother Jacqueline after his parents divorced when he was three.
He dismissed the claims as ‘hearsay.’
El-Sayed was born in Michigan to an Egyptian father and mother.
El-Sayed’s mother, Fatten Elkomy, had worked for the Islamic American Relief Agency, a charity later sanctioned by US authorities over alleged links to terrorist financing.
In October 2004, the Treasury Department designated IARA’s parent network a supporter of terrorism, accusing it of funding Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda.
The US branch was shut down and the American arm later pleaded guilty to funnelling $1.37 million to Iraq in breach of US sanctions.
Elkomy was not charged with a crime, and no evidence has established that she knew of or participated in the organization’s alleged terrorist financing.
The latest InsiderAdvantage poll of Michigan’s Senate race shows El-Sayed holding a narrow 2.3-point lead over Rogers, with 47.8 percent support to Rogers’ 45.5 percent.
The poll, conducted October 9-10 among 1,200 likely voters, found that 5.4 percent were still undecided.
