MAGA-loyalist Michigan Senate candidate Mike Rogers is trying to court Jewish Democrats to defect to his campaign — but so far, his messaging has not landed, local Jewish leaders are saying.
Rogers, who lost his 2024 Senate race by fewer than 20,000 votes, is now targeting Jewish voters uneasy with Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed, one of the most vocal Israel critics running statewide this year, NOTUS reported. This week brought a new Rogers campaign ad featuring a self-described "pi--ed off Democrat," plus a circulating open letter from Jewish Democrats urging their community to back Rogers over El-Sayed, whom Rogers has previously called "beyond antisemitic."
Decky Alexander, chair of the Michigan Democratic Jewish Caucus, isn't buying the letter's framing: "That letter does not reflect our caucus at all." Meanwhile, Washtenaw County Democratic Party leaders Alexander and Theresa Reid, who oversee one of the state's largest Jewish communities, "stressed that the issue is not monolithic and there is a significant diversity in thought among Jewish voters," said NOTUS.
Alexander, for her part, says her group is withholding any endorsement until a late-August event where El-Sayed and other statewide candidates will speak, though she acknowledges El-Sayed still needs to do more outreach and sharpen his messaging around Israel, including offering a clearer answer when asked whether Israel has a right to exist — a question he's dodged as a "gotcha game" in past interviews.
Political strategist Adrian Hemond agreed that ambiguity is a liability, saying, "He's never given a direct answer to that question, and I think that concerns about his views will persist until he does."
Polling suggests the stakes may be smaller than the letter implies: Jewish voters make up roughly 1.4 percent of Michigan's electorate, and a recent survey of Michigan Democrats found Israel and Gaza positions ranked low in importance for most voters, with nearly half viewing the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), one of the most vocal groups pushing the issue, unfavorably.
Meanwhile, AIPAC itself may be gearing up to spend for Rogers, according to The New York Times, after already breaking spending records to support Rep. Haley Stevens during the Democratic primary.
With Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin having won her own 2024 race against Rogers by less than half a percentage point, both parties know a shift of just a few thousand votes could decide who represents Michigan next.