A divisive Democratic primary for Senate in Michigan on Tuesday, arguably the party's most consequential contest so far this year, will reveal whether a progressive and socialist groundswell has spread to America's heartland.
The race, in a state critical to the party's prospects for winning a Senate majority, has featured months of infighting over what the party stands for.
The battle between Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive former local public-health official, and Rep. Haley Stevens, a four-term congresswoman, encapsulates virtually everything dividing Democrats. There has been debate over who is to blame for 2024 election failures, the type of candidate best positioned to beat Republicans in November, the role of corporate and big-dollar campaign money, and the U.S. relationship with Israel.
El-Sayed has support among the Democratic Socialists of America movement, a rising faction within the party that President Trump and Republicans have branded as "communism" and are eagerly using as a line of attack against all Democrats. Republicans say they are eager to run against El-Sayed, arguing his left-wing views will turn off swing voters.
Michigan Republicans are poised to nominate former Rep. Mike Rogers, who narrowly lost the state's 2024 Senate race. The seat is being vacated by Sen. Gary Peters, a Democrat who chose not to seek a third term.
A Democratic loss in Michigan would make it harder for the party to net a gain of four Senate seats in order to flip control of the chamber in November. Trump won the state by 1.4 percentage points in 2024, and its Senate race is rated a tossup by nonpartisan analysts.
If El-Sayed wins, it would be a sign that the party's leftward shift is taking place beyond coastal and deeply blue enclaves, such as in New York and Colorado, where DSA-aligned candidates have defeated more centrist incumbents in Democratic primaries. It would also add wind to the sails of progressive and DSA candidates in coming primaries, including those with similar dynamics in Wisconsin and Minnesota that follow just one week later.
"It's a huge risk to nominate a far-left candidate in a swing state in such an important year," said former Rep. Cheri Bustos, a centrist Democrat who repeatedly won a western Illinois congressional district filled with Trump voters. "El-Sayed will be an El-headache for Democrats. The Democratic Party has to learn the same lesson over and over again: These far-left socialist candidates are not electable in the swingiest districts and swingiest states."
El-Sayed is endorsed by progressive icons Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, and the United Auto Workers. He has also campaigned with Hasan Piker, an online influencer who has been accused of antisemitism.
Centrists in the party argue that victories by the progressive wing could hurt Democratic chances of scoring major gains in an otherwise favorable election environment. Trump's job-approval rating hit an all-time low in a recent Quinnipiac University poll, and gas prices are high amid growing concerns about the war with Iran.
Stevens is backed by Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, among other establishment figures, as well as by some unions, pro-Israel groups and Emilys List, which supports abortion-rights candidates.
Stevens has acknowledged El-Sayed's campaigning talents, describing herself as a workhorse competing against a show horse and arguing her opponent -- a veteran podcaster -- is more interested in celebrity status than in helping Michigan.
The race showcases deep divisions among Democrats about how to win competitive elections. One wing asserts that battleground districts and states are won by wooing independent voters with moderate policy ideas, while another thinks voters are eager for dramatic change at a time of widespread skepticism of government and widening economic disparity.
"This is a chips-on-the-table moment where there are two different theories of the case," said Adam Green, co-founder of the advocacy group Progressive Change Campaign Committee and a supporter of El-Sayed. "This is ground zero for the future of the Democratic Party."
Green challenged suggestions from establishment Democrats that El-Sayed is a risky general-election candidate. "If El-Sayed wins, after $60 million of special-interest money was spent against him, that sends a message to every Democratic politician that it is OK to cross those interests if the people are on your side," he said.
Ad spending has been lopsided in favor of Stevens. Her campaign and its allies have spent $61 million this year through Saturday, compared with $6.5 million by El-Sayed and his allies, ad-tracking firm AdImpact shows. It is the third-most-expensive Senate primary on record and the second-most-expensive so far in the 2025-2026 cycle, AdImpact says.
A group with ties to the pro-Israel American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which is backing Stevens, is by far the biggest ad spender, at $30 million through Saturday. Stevens has declined to engage on questions about Aipac's support.
Successful Democrats in Michigan have tended to emphasize centrism. They include Whitmer, who beat El-Sayed in a 2018 gubernatorial primary by 22 percentage points. Jonathan Cowan, president of the centrist Democratic group Third Way, said Stevens is the party's best bet if it wants to win control of the Senate.
"His proudly extremist shtick won't work in a general election," he said. "To have any chance at winning over the middle in a state Trump carried twice, he would need to denounce the Democratic Socialists of America and their radical agenda, ditch Piker, affirm Israel's right to exist and reverse his past commitment to defunding the police." El-Sayed has distanced himself from prior calls to defund the police.
Cowan noted the "hard-left" has yet to flip a Senate seat from red to blue in the modern era, or flip a single House seat since 2018.
Almost every poll released publicly in July shows El-Sayed with a lead, some by more than 10 points.
El-Sayed bristled in a recent Wall Street Journal interview when asked how he relates to DSA, a group some of his supporters associate with. "I'm not technically or practically DSA," he said.
Stevens has been aggressively courting Black voters, who accounted for about one-fifth of the electorate in the state's previous competitive Democratic primary, during the 2020 presidential election. She and groups backing her have repeatedly sought to connect her with former President Barack Obama, who praised her at a rally when she first ran for Congress in 2018. She also worked on his task force to rescue the automotive industry, Michigan's economic backbone.
Obama hasn't endorsed in the race. Stevens does have the backing of the Congressional Black Caucus and the Michigan Democratic Party Black Caucus.
El-Sayed supports Medicare-for-all, free child care, calls Israel's actions in Gaza "genocide" and wants to see the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency abolished.
Stevens supports a government-run health plan that would compete with private options, favors removing Social Security's payroll tax cap so earnings above $184,500 would be taxed and wants to see paid family leave for workers nationalized.
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