Former President Barack Obama is expected to hit the campaign trail for Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed later this month, years after El-Sayed sometimes criticized Obama’s presidency as a failure, saying it didn’t leave the country “in a better place.”
In comments reviewed by CNN’s KFile from Obama’s 2012 re-election through the 2020 Democratic presidential campaign, El-Sayed blamed him for perpetuating war, eroding civil liberties, overseeing record deportations and preserving economic and health systems that he said favored corporations over ordinary people.
He also rejected the Affordable Care Act as insufficient and argued that Obama’s progressive approach helped create the conditions for Donald Trump’s rise.
The comments, made in editorials, interviews and panels, stand in stark contrast to El-Sayed’s current alliance with Obama, who is now campaigning for the progressive doctor as he faces Republican Mike Rogers in a tight Michigan Senate race that could help determine control of the chamber.
El-Sayed’s criticism of Obama has often been scathing.
In a 2012 HuffPost essay written shortly after Obama’s reelection, El-Sayed — who said she voted for him — accused the president of failing to bring the “hope and change” that defined his 2008 campaign. “This leader has perpetuated war, violated our civil liberties, expelled more people from our shores than any president before him, and the list of his failures goes on.” he wrote.
“This memory will remind us not of the story we wrote that night, but of the stupid emotions of a naive young man who did not understand that hope and change required more than flowery prose and a winning smile,” El-Sayed wrote of Obama’s first election. “I have little hope because there have been fewer changes.”
“Let’s be clear: For progressives who care about peace, prosperity, civil liberties and the future of our country, Obama’s re-election last night was not a victory. We chose a rock over a hard place,” he added.
El-Sayed also criticized the Affordable Care Act, Obama’s signature achievement and legacy during his two terms, calling it a “watered-down reform that panders to the interests of health care lobbies.”
El-Sayed went on to criticize Obama on a range of issues, criticizing the expansion of the war on terror in Pakistan and Yemen, the use of drone strikes, the economy, widening inequality and what he described as an erosion of civil liberties.
Although El-Sayed made it clear that he voted for Obama in 2008 and 2012, he framed that support as a choice between the lesser of two evils against former Republican Gov. Mitt Romney.
In a statement provided to CNN as part of his campaign, El-Sayed praised the former president.
“At 24, I watched President Obama win in 2008. He changed what was possible for someone like me, with a name like mine. Even though he faced one of the toughest hands of any American president, he handled the situation. And despite everything he has done, there is so much more to do. This is where the next generation, inspired by him and his leadership, will take over. We are on the shoulders of giants – and I can’t wait to tell him myself later this month.
El-Sayed’s campaign pushed back on the notion that his past criticism reflected broader hostility toward Obama, providing numerous examples over the years in which El-Sayed praised him personally. The campaign noted that El-Sayed repeatedly said Obama’s 2008 victory inspired him to believe someone with his background and name could run for office.
It is also provided an exchange in 2020 in a since-deleted tweet, in which El-Sayed said he could disagree with “many” of Obama’s decisions and believed the country was “no better off” after his presidency while viewing Obama as “competent, consistent and committed to the American people.”
His comments are not limited to 2012.
Five years later, while running for governor of Michigan, El-Sayed distanced himself from Obama again in a 2017 interview with Vox titled “Don’t Call This Man” the Next Obama. ‘”
Although he praised Obama for broadening the perception of who might aspire to a political career, El-Sayed said there were “a lot of things I disagree with President Obama on” in domestic and foreign policy and described Obama’s policies as “pretty centrist, middle-of-the-road Democratic policy.”
“There is frustration (among voters) that elites are telling them their economy is back and they should just be happy,” El-Sayed said. “But that’s not the case. Frankly, the economic recovery has largely benefited businesses and hasn’t really benefited people like them.”
El-Sayed nevertheless believes that Obama did good things as president, such as bailing out the American auto industry, but not enough.
“I don’t think he was strong enough on things like health care. I don’t think he was strong enough when it came to regulating big banks. I don’t think he was strong enough when it came to campaign finance reform, nor strong enough on immigration.”
A year later, El-Sayed criticized the Democratic Party again in an interview with progressive podcast host Katie Halper in December 2018 after discussing Obama’s response to the Flint water crisis.
Asked how Democratic failures helped pave the way for a figure like Donald Trump, El-Sayed said his criticism came from a responsibility to the people the government was supposed to serve.
“When Democrats adhere to an ideology that we should all focus on the well-being of corporations rather than the well-being of real people, when we forget what suffering looks like, then we make mistakes,” El-Sayed said. He said voters might then look at the political establishment of both parties and conclude: “You’re all the same, because you’ve all failed.”
Speaking in January 2020 at a University of Chicago Politics Institute panel titled “Democrats: Whose Party Is It Anyway?” “, El-Sayed argued that Democrats needed sweeping structural changes to address inequality rather than more progressive policies, warning that they would otherwise repeat what he called the “same mistakes” of the Obama years.
“We will continue to make the same mistakes of the last eight years under Barack Obama,” he said. “As a country, we are in no better place eight years after Obama was elected in 2008 than when he was elected. And I say that as someone who loves him dearly.”
“Look where we are right now. Look where we are right now. We’re debating how we defeated the most dangerous president in American history,” El-Sayed added.
El-Sayed added that while Obama made significant achievements, his administration failed to fundamentally change the economic and healthcare systems, leaving many Americans feeling insecure. The problems, El-Sayed said, helped create the conditions for Trump’s rise.
“I appreciate the fact that we’re not giving him credit for what he’s done for the economy in the short term. But the structure of the economy hasn’t changed under Barack Obama. The solutions to actually thinking about ensuring that our health care system is equitable and sustainable, haven’t changed under Barack Obama. And unless we’re willing to admit that, then we risk going back to the edge of the cliff that we fell into in 2016.”
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