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A looming question in the state\u2019s pivotal Senate race is whether he can keep the old one intact \u2014 particularly with the Black voters who are pivotal to any Democratic victory.\n \n\n \n The Republican nominee, former Rep. Mike Rogers, has spent months working to make inroads with traditional Democratic constituencies that did not support El-Sayed, a progressive former public health official, in his bitter primary battle against Rep. Haley Stevens.\n \n\n \n And even though more than $280 million has been spent on television advertisements in Michigan since the 2026 midterm election cycle began, with billboards and campaign yard signs dotting the landscape alongside the fall colors, some political leaders wonder whether there is sufficient enthusiasm among Black voters for El-Sayed at this late stage.\n \n\n \n \u201cIt only takes this much of Detroit to defect. It only takes this much of Flint to defect,\u201d said the Rev. Charles Williams II, pastor of the Historic King Solomon Baptist Church in Detroit, holding his fingers about an inch apart to drive home his point. \u201cIf even a sliver of people don\u2019t turn out, you run into a huge challenge in trying to get your candidate over that line.\u201d\n \n\n\n\n\n \n \n\n \n Michigan is crucial to Democrats\u2019 hopes of the net four-seat gain the party needs on November 3 to win control of the Senate. If the party fails to retain the seat of retiring Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, its path to a majority would grow much more difficult \u2014 and would run almost exclusively through much redder states than this upper Midwestern perpetual political battleground.\n \n\n \n El-Sayed defeated Stevens in the August primary by just 1 percentage point \u2014 a narrow victory fueled by his strong support among Arab American and Muslim communities, young voters and progressives in college towns.\n \n\n \n But Stevens had clear strengths, too: Black voters in and around Detroit largely aligned behind her, as did Jewish voters who have long expressed deep concerns with El-Sayed, who is Muslim and a strident critic of Israel\u2019s actions in Gaza.\n \n\n \n Rogers has made reaching those constituencies a central focus of his campaign in the race\u2019s closing weeks, as he looks to assemble a coalition of voters more favorable to Republicans than in 2018, the last midterm election with President Donald Trump in office. That year, Democrats won four statewide races in Michigan, all by a range of about 7 to 9 percentage points.\n \n\n \n At a Detroit Economic Club forum on Tuesday, Rogers bragged that he has \u201cbuilt coalitions that really are very untraditional for a Republican candidate.\u201d\n \n\n \n He pointed to plans to incentivize new home construction in Detroit, connect those construction efforts to high school apprenticeships, and eliminate \u201cfood deserts\u201d in the city. He also said many Democrats have told him they fear the rising influence of democratic socialists within the party.\n \n\n \n \u201cWe\u2019ve spent a lot of time here in Detroit, Flint, Pontiac,\u201d he said, listing cities with large Black populations. \u201cI think if we\u2019re going to get our state right, we have to have everybody included in its forward progress.\u201d\n \n\n \n In a bid to ease lingering Democratic doubts about El-Sayed, former President Barack Obama is set to visit Michigan, where he\u2019ll attend a Saturday rally in Detroit with El-Sayed and the party\u2019s nominee for governor, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson.\n \n\n\n \n \n\n \n Other prominent Black Democrats have visited Michigan in recent weeks, including former Vice President Kamala Harris, who held a roundtable focused on Black maternal healthcare with El-Sayed. Sen. Raphael Warnock of Georgia is also set to campaign with El-Sayed, as are several members of the Congressional Black Caucus.\n \n\n \n \u201cAs much as he thinks he\u2019s making inroads, folks are smart,\u201d El-Sayed told CNN. \u201cMike Rogers is simply a rubber stamp on what Donald Trump wants. They understand exactly who Mike Rogers is.\u201d\n \n\n \n While conversations with Black leaders and voters across Detroit show widespread support for El-Sayed, quiet concerns emerged about whether questions pertaining to the nominee\u2019s background could dampen support. Historic tensions between Arab American and Black communities also were raised as points of anxiety.\n \n\n \n \u201cIn a close race, even a sliver of doubt about Abdul could lead to defeat,\u201d one prominent Black leader told CNN, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss concerns frankly. \u201cAnd this race feels far closer than it should.\u201d\n \n\n\n\n \n Even as prominent Black Democratic leaders in Michigan express concern about the Senate race, El-Sayed \u2014 who spent recent days campaigning in Michigan\u2019s Upper Peninsula, a sparsely populated region where he hopes his populist pitch will chip away at the GOP\u2019s traditionally strong margins \u2014 is downplaying and even mocking Rogers\u2019 efforts to win over Black voters.\n \n\n \n At a campaign stop in Flint, a majority-Black city, a few hundred supporters turned out for an El-Sayed rally on Sunday afternoon. Only about a dozen members of the audience who packed into a large hotel conference room were Black, which was striking for a Democratic campaign event two weeks before the election.\n \n\n\n \n \n\n \n As he spoke to reporters afterward, El-Sayed said he saw no reason for concern.\n \n\n \n \u201cLook, one of the hardest things about this economy is that too often folks are having to work multiple jobs and having to work on weekends,\u201d he told CNN. \u201cWe know because of exactly the policies architected by folks like Donald Trump, that falls hardest on Black folks.\u201d\n \n\n \n He was joined at the rally by Democratic Rep. Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts, one of several Black members of Congress who have traveled to campaign alongside him.\n \n\n \n \u201cWe feel really strong about the relationship we\u2019ve built and will continue to build,\u201d El-Sayed said of his outreach to Black voters.\n \n\n \n When asked about the Rogers campaign opening a storefront office on Livernois Avenue in Detroit as part of its effort to win over Black voters, El-Sayed answered with a laugh.\n \n\n \n \u201cI saw he opened a cute little office in Detroit where he brought all his friends from the suburbs to come clap him in. It was nice, yeah,\u201d El-Sayed said. \u201cHe\u2019s got no actual message for anyone who is struggling to make ends meet.\u201d\n \n\n \n Marcia Turner, who attended the Flint rally, said she was optimistic about El-Sayed, who she called \u201cthe right person at the right time.\u201d But even her kind words underscored a history of some tension between the Black and Arab communities of Michigan.\n \n\n \n \u201cI love that he\u2019s running,\u201d Turner said. \u201cI think people are looking past his religion and seeing him as a man who wants what we want for our children and grandchildren.\u201d\n \n\n\n\n\n \n \n\n \n Naura Evans, a teacher and mother of two from Sterling Heights, is a proud Black Republican. She appears in a television commercial, saying: \u201cI voted for Barack Obama, but this year, I\u2019m voting for Mike Rogers.\u201d\n \n\n \n She said she grew up in a Democratic family but has become more conservative since her 2008 vote for Obama. She said she thinks schools and neighborhoods haven\u2019t improved under Democratic rule and believes in Rogers\u2019 plans for both.\n \n\n \n She said she feels that Democrats have taken Black voters for granted over the years, so she spends time going door-to-door in Warren, Troy and Sterling Heights, trying to persuade voters to join her in supporting Rogers.\n \n\n\n \n \n\n\n \n \n\n \n \u201cIt\u2019s very important that we elect the right people,\u201d Evans said. \u201cAs Blacks in our community, we show that our vote matters. We\u2019re not just giving the vote away.\u201d\n \n\n \n She said the Rogers campaign should get credit for opening an office in Detroit.\n \n\n \n \u201cI\u2019ve seen Mike Rogers definitely step out of his space and go into the Black community,\u201d Evans said. \u201cI think it\u2019s practical and I think it\u2019s also symbolic that he cares about Detroit. He could have opened an office anywhere and he chose Detroit.\u201d\n \n\n \n She dismissed one of the biggest pieces of criticism she hears from Democrats about Rogers \u2014 that he would be a rubber stamp for Trump.\n \n\n \n \u201cThis is not a presidential election, it\u2019s a senator\u2019s election, and ultimately Mike Rogers will be the one making his own decisions,\u201d Evans said. \u201cI\u2019m sure that his decisions will not be influenced by someone else.\u201d\n \n\n\n\n\n \n \n\n \n Quentin Murray listened to the full slate of Democratic candidates speaking at a carpenters\u2019 union hall on Sunday in Detroit. He said he was just beginning to learn more about El-Sayed\u2019s candidacy but liked what he heard.\n \n\n \n \u201cI like what he\u2019s bringing to the table \u2014 something new, something different,\u201d said Murray, a carpenter. \u201cHis culture is different, but when you see somebody like that, it\u2019s good to know that we have the same interests and values.\u201d\n \n\n \n Yet even in his praise, Murray casually brought up El-Sayed\u2019s culture, which has been at the center of the campaign in bitter attack ads about his upbringing and beliefs.\n \n\n \n El-Sayed, a doctor and former public health official whose parents immigrated to the US from Egypt, was born and raised in Michigan.\n \n\n \n At nearly every campaign stop, he briefly explains his family history and pushes back at some of the racially charged conversations about his name, which has been regularly belittled by Trump, who has taken to calling him \u201cMohammed Abdul El-Sayed.\u201d\n \n\n \n\n\n\n\n\n \n Rogers has attempted to connect El-Sayed to the Muslim Brotherhood \u2014 which El-Sayed has denounced \u2014 and cast him as sympathetic to interests connected to Islamic terror. The GOP has pointed to old tweets from his sister describing El-Sayed\u2019s birth mother\u2019s activism with the Muslim Brotherhood while she was in college in the early 1970s. In a recent debate, Rogers also pointed out that El-Sayed\u2019s mother worked for the Islamic American Relief Agency, a nonprofit that the Treasury Department in 2004 designated as an organization supporting terrorism. El-Sayed was primarily raised by his father and stepmother in Michigan.\n \n\n \n \u201cMy name and my faith are not the reason you can\u2019t afford your gas. My name and my faith are not the reason you cannot afford your groceries,\u201d El-Sayed told supporters in Flint. \u201cMy name and my faith are not the reason you can\u2019t see a doctor. I mean chances are if you\u2019re seeing a doctor, they might actually have my name and my faith.\u201d\n \n\n\n\n \n Charity Dean, who owns a Detroit coffee shop and is president of the Michigan Black Business Alliance, said she has been pleasantly surprised by the enthusiasm for El-Sayed in her city.\n \n\n \n \u201cDetroit is more conservative than folks would think \u2014 a lot more moderate,\u201d Dean said. \u201cI think his campaign has done a phenomenal job of really busting out of the box and saying, \u2018Are you happy with how things are now? Are you happy with forever wars?\u2019\u201d\n \n\n \n Since finishing a distant second in Detroit in the August primary, Dean said, El-Sayed has listened to voters \u2014 supportive and skeptical ones alike \u2014 and has worked to build a campaign to win them over.\n \n\n \n \u201cOne of the things that\u2019s gained him a lot of ground is his ability to respond to criticism and questions,\u201d Dean said.\n \n\n \n While Dean said she has seen many signs that Rogers is trying to expand his outreach to Black voters, including television ads and opening an office in Detroit, she questioned whether the Republican nominee\u2019s policies followed suit with the actions of his campaign.\n \n\n \n \u201cEverything should be taken seriously. This is not a year where we take anything for granted,\u201d Dean said, noting that she is carefully watching what the Rogers campaign is doing. \u201cHe seriously wants to win their vote, but he doesn\u2019t want to make life better for Black people. 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