El-Sayed won 50% of Jewish vote but underperformed compared to other Democrats, poll finds

A poll released Friday found that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed won 50% of the Jewish vote, underperforming other Democrats. Democrat Jocelyn Benson won 69% of the Jewish vote in the gubernatorial race. The survey of 883 Michigan Jewish voters had a 3.9 percentage point margin of error.

A poll released on Friday found that Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed received around half of the Jewish vote, underperforming other Democrats in the US midterms. El-Sayed won the race earlier this month — the first Muslim elected to the US Senate — as part of the Democrats’ crushing nationwide performance against Republicans. His candidacy roiled Michigan’s Jews due to his initial equivocation about an attempted terrorist attack on a synagogue near Detroit, his anti-Zionism and hostility toward Israel, and his partnership with the anti-Israel streamer Hasan Piker. The poll, by The Jewish Majority research group, found that 50 percent of Jewish voters backed El-Sayed, 43% voted for Republican Mike Rogers, 4% left the Senate race blank and 3% chose another candidate. By comparison, in Michigan’s gubernatorial race, Democratic candidate Jocelyn Benson won 69% of the Jewish vote, outpacing El-Sayed by 19 percentage points. For Democratic-leaning respondents, 93% supported Benson and 70% El-Sayed, a 23-point gap. The survey found that 67% of respondents identified as Democrat or leaned Democrat. In Oakland County, a center of Jewish life, Rogers won the Jewish vote with 52%, while 39% voted for El-Sayed. The research surveyed 883 Michigan Jewish voters and had a margin of error of 3.9 percentage points.