LANSING — Republican President Donald Trump called Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed “Mohammed El-Sayed” in an Oct. 7 social media post that was quickly denounced as racist by Arab American leaders in Michigan.

Trump’s message on Truth Social came a day before El-Sayed, who is Muslim and a former public health official, was to participate in the first general election debate of his U.S. Senate race against Republican Mike Rogers.

“Mohammed El-Sayed is a terrible Candidate for the Dumocrats,” Trump wrote in a post that appeared at about 11 p.m. “While his opponent, Mike Rogers, is an extremely good one, Mohammed goes back to the days of the Jihad.

“He is a RADICAL Extremist, Terrorist Sympathizer, and no different from his best friend, America Hating Hasan Piker.”

El-Sayed’s full name is Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed. But he’s generally gone by Abdul since kindergarten, according to his book “Healing Politics.”

But the president’s use of the wrong first name for El-Sayed drew a swift backlash.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of New York said on social media that El-Sayed “is on the road to being the next Senator from Michigan no matter how much bigoted bull—- a weak and desperate Donald Trump throws at him.”

In a phone interview, Michigan state Rep. Alabas Farhat, D-Dearborn, said Trump’s comments were bigoted, racist and a desperate attempt to distract from his failed record on the economy.

Trump was displaying hypocrisy after campaigning for votes two years ago in Dearborn and Hamtramck, two Michigan cities with large Arab-American populations, Farhat said.

“If Mike Rogers truly wants to be a U.S. senator that represents everyone in Michigan, he should denounce Donald Trump for his bigoted comments right now,” Farhat said.

Alyssa Brouillet, a spokeswoman for Rogers, said the Senate race isn’t about El-Sayed’s name or how he prays.

“It has everything to do with his extreme ideas that would devastate working families—from his high-tax agenda to abolish private health insurance to calling to empty the prisons,” Brouillet said Oct. 8 in a statement. “Michigan can’t afford Abdul El-Sayed.”

El-Sayed and Rogers are running to fill a Senate seat that has been held by Sen. Gary Peters, D-Bloomfield Township, who declined to pursue another six-year term in 2026.

Trump’s use of El-Sayed’s middle name was reminiscent of his past practice of referring to former President Barack Obama by his middle name, Hussein. Critics of Trump have long argued he uses Obama’s middle name to paint him as Muslim, even though Obama was raised a Protestant Christian.

Former Michigan House Floor Leader Abraham Aiyash, a Democrat who represented Hamtramck in the state House, said Trump was defaulting to “what he knows best: racist distractions to shift attention away from high gas, groceries and utility bills.”

“This November, plenty of Mohammeds, Jacobs, Matthews, Marys and everyone in between will cast their vote for Abdul El-Sayed because they want money out of politics, money in their pockets and a check on Trump’s corruption,” Aiyash said.

University of Michigan Regent Jordan Acker, a Jewish Democrat who has expressed concerns about El-Sayed and his candidacy, said there are many ways to critique him “without resorting to ethnic or racial slurs.”

“The behavior of President Trump is unacceptable, and @MikeRogersForMI, if he is truly standing up for all Michiganders, should condemn this disgusting remark,” Acker wrote on social media.

Trump endorsed Rogers to be Michigan’s next U.S. senator last year, calling him someone who had served the nation with distinction.

El-Sayed responded to Trump’s Oct. 7 post by saying it was “time for change.”

“He thinks so low of us,” El-Sayed wrote on X. “He thinks he can use my name and my faith to distract us from the suffering his policies are inflicting on us at the pump, at the grocery store and at the doctor’s office.

“He thinks we don’t know any better.”

In an interview, Republican National Committee Chairman Joe Gruters said that Trump was probably motivated by remarks from left-wing streamer and commentator Hasan Piker specifically about the Hamas attack on Israel three years ago, saying that it doesn’t matter if rapes happened on Oct. 7, 2023.

Piker had campaigned with El-Sayed during the Democratic primary.

“I think, just like it infuriated me, I think it probably infuriated the president, and he probably said we can’t allow this type of radicalism in America. And so, if I had to guess, I think that’s probably what it was about,” Gruters told The Detroit News on Oct. 8 ahead of Rogers and El-Sayed’s prime time debate.

Asked if remarks like Trump’s could hurt GOP candidates in Michigan’s large Muslim or Arab-American community, Gruters said the “Islamic community largely rejects the wokeism on the left.”

“On the cultural issues, they’re much more aligned with us. I expect Mike Rogers to get plenty of votes from all demographics,” Gruters said.

Rogers and El-Sayed will debate at 7 p.m. on Oct. 8 inside the Grand Rapids television studios of WOOD-TV. The debate will be broadcast live in the Detroit market on WWJ-TV (Channel 62).

cmauger@detroitnews.com

mburke@detroitnews.com

This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: President Trump calls Abdul El-Sayed ‘Mohammed,’ post labeled racist

Reporting by Craig Mauger and Melissa Nann Burke, The Detroit News / The Detroit News

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