After weeks of attacking Michigan's Democratic Senate nominee, a White House bigwig has been accused by the candidate of using paste to complete his look.
Abdul El-Sayed, who is running for an open Senate seat in Michigan, levied a fake-beard accusation at Vice President JD Vance during an interview with TMZ reporter Jacob Wasserman posted Friday on X. The Democratic candidate faces Republican Mike Rogers in November in a contest that could decide which party controls the Senate.
El-Sayed brought up the vice president while describing the Democratic candidates he is campaigning alongside this fall, according to the video.
"Ohio, JD Vance, amped up on TRT with a beard that, you know — I don't know," El-Sayed said. "Frankly, somebody should tell me if it's real."
TRT stands for testosterone replacement therapy, a hormone treatment that raises testosterone levels. El-Sayed offered no evidence in the interview that Vance uses it.
"If I actually met him, I'd be like, all right, let's just actually see," El-Sayed said. "How much paste did you have to put on your face to get that little beard?"
"At least mine — what you see is what you get," he said of his own beard.
"If he thinks that my beard is somehow indicative of my strength, I'm happy to invite him to any weight room in any place," El-Sayed said. "We could do it in D.C., and let's see."
"I'd love to see him on a bench. I'd love to see him on a squat," he continued. "I'd love to understand if he's as strong as he likes to pretend."
"A bench-off. I'd be there," Wasserman replied.
"You went to Ohio State. Didn't even know how to handle the trophy when you had to pick it up," El-Sayed said, addressing Vance directly.
"And now you're on what? Like, juiced up on TRT," he said. "I'm all natural, bro."
Vance kicked off the feud over facial hair on Tuesday with a TikTok video attacking El-Sayed's beard, HuffPost reported.
"So I heard in the state of Michigan they have outlawed patchy beards," Vance said in the clip, climbing into what appears to be a police truck. "Get in, patriots. We're going to arrest Abdul El-Sayed."
Vance has joked before that he "hates good-looking guys with beards," according to HuffPost. In those remarks, he said such men make him feel "jealous."
In additional remarks on Tuesday, Vance urged House Republicans to campaign against El-Sayed instead of focusing on less controversial Democrats.
"He's got enough material for the whole country," Vance said, according to NBC News.
The two have traded personal attacks since last month, when Vance focused on El-Sayed's Muslim identity during a speech at an Ohio steel plant, and El-Sayed responded by invoking the vice president's wife, according to HuffPost.
"My issue with you is not your beard, as much as you wanna make it about my beard," El-Sayed told TMZ on Friday.
"My issue with you is that you are out here riding policy that you know is stupid," he explained. "You know the tariff war is stupid. You know the Iran war is stupid."
"And then you try to act the tough guy, because you can't be a tough guy to the actual boss, because you're afraid of him," El-Sayed said.
