Abdul El-Sayed engaged in a heated exchange with Martha MacCallum over the Iran War during an appearance by the left-wing Michigan Senate candidate on Fox News Monday.
El-Sayed currently holds a narrow polling lead over Republican former Congressman Mike Rogers in Michigan, a crucial state Democrats must win if they hope to take control of the Senate.
The former public health official has made opposition to the war in Iran—and to most forms of US military intervention overseas—a central theme of his campaign.
MacCallum pressed El-Sayed on those positions during her Fox News program Monday afternoon while discussing recent terrorist attacks. El-Sayed described the attacks as “awful and terrible” following the FlyDubai hijacking.
She cited El-Sayed’s earlier comment that “we need to be curious about people who do them, what causes them to do these sorts of things, why these things happen, what happens when individuals who commit these acts are in pain.”
MacCallum said his remarks appeared to suggest that the United States had “been on the wrong side of our own policies” and that he was arguing terrorism was “our fault.”
“No, it’s not—the victim is never at fault, and terrorism is wrong no matter who perpetrates the terrorism, who it is perpetrated against,” El-Sayed replied before turning the discussion toward Iran.
“War is a system of violence, when you think about a war we shouldn’t be fighting, like the war in Iran right now,” he said.
Abdul El-Sayed (pictured left) clashed with Martha MacCallum (pictured right) over the Iran War during the left-wing Michigan Senate candidate’s appearance on Fox News Monday.
El-Sayed holds a slight polling lead over Republican former Congressman Mike Rogers in a pivotal state Democrats need to win to flip the Senate.
MacCallum responded: “Probably because Iran created a huge threat to the neighborhood and killed thousands of American citizens.”
El-Sayed countered that the nuclear threat posed by Iran had been contained under the Iran deal negotiated during Barack Obama’s presidency.
His comments came on the same day that he announced a Michigan rally featuring the former president.
“I don’t know about that, they had been breaking the JCPOA by many estimations,” MacCallum said, referring to the nuclear agreement.
El-Sayed maintained that the threat had been contained and asked: “Ask yourself, does more war make us safer?”
As MacCallum attempted to respond, El-Sayed interjected: “I haven’t finished my point, I just want to finish what I was saying. We’re in a situation where we could have chosen peace and instead we chose war, and now you’ve got a situation at the Strait of Hormuz where we can’t move oil and gas.”
MacCallum eventually responded by pointing to a Wall Street Journal report that said the region was “almost to level of getting oil out of the strait and the region.”
El-Sayed then asked: “So why are our gas prices so high?”
MacCallum challenged El-Sayed over his foreign-policy views during her Fox News show Monday afternoon. He condemned the recent terrorist attacks as “awful and terrible” after the FlyDubai hijacking.
Trump addressed the interview at a rally in Nebraska Monday night, calling El-Sayed “a total communist.”
Join the discussion
Is opposing US military action in Iran patriotic or dangerously naive in today’s world?
‘I think you are going to start to see them come down. That’s what we’re seeing from economists,’ MacCallum said.
‘That’s not what Michiganders are experiencing at the pump, ‘ El-Sayed responded.
It got even more heated, as MacCallum accused El-Sayed of filibustering before he argued MacCallum was a ‘fan’ of the war in Iran.
Trump reacted to the interview at his rally in Nebraska Monday night, calling El-Sayed ‘a total communist.’
‘El-Sayed was interviewed on a certain network. I won’t tell you which one (FOX). They hardly fight him at all. Why are they putting these people on our television networks? Why they always have to put Jessica Tarlov, another loser? They should stop,’ he added.
Michigan is one of the true toss-ups in November, as Progressive insurgent Abdul El-Sayed was declared the winner of a rollercoaster Democratic primary for the US Senate after squeaking by with a slim victory over Congresswoman Haley Stevens.
His single-point win raises new questions about whether his strength among base voters can translate to a general election this fall, as Democrats look to flip four seats necessary to secure a majority in the upper chamber.
El-Sayed fared well with Arab-American and younger voters, while Stevens nabbed support from older Democrats as well as African-American voters who do not seem ready to back El-Sayed in November.
Rogers, a former House GOP lawmaker, has been biding his time as the GOP’s presumptive nominee for months, waiting on a challenger to emerge from the Democratic Party.
The seat is rated as a ‘toss up’ by the Cook Political Report.
