Abdul El-Sayed had harsh words for Bret Baier when the Fox News anchor pressed him on his alleged ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has repeatedly clashed with Fox News anchor Bret Baier over questions about his alleged ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
El-Sayed, 41, is running against Republican Mike Rogers, 63, for a Michigan Senate seat in upcoming terms and has been the target of repeated allegations that he has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
Fox News star Bret Baier’s interview with Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed got heated.
The implication that El-Sayed, who is Muslim, has “dual loyalty” to the United States and the Muslim Brotherhood was pushed by Rogers’ campaign. The Trump administration has designated some branches of the organization as terrorist groups.
During an on-the-street interview with Baier on Friday, El-Sayed didn’t even let the host finish a question on the topic before beginning to respond.
“Mike Rogers really took on this Muslim Brotherhood thing. I know you don’t want to talk about your family and the history there, but he’s going back…,” Baier began.
“Let me stop there,” El-Sayed interjected. “You ask this question to raise a question about…whether or not I have dual loyalties.”
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Baier said he wanted to ask about an open letter signed by El-Sayed in 2012 regarding former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, a leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, but El-Sayed interrupted him again.
“My loyalty will be to the Constitution of the United States,” El-Sayed said emphatically. “And like every senator who has ever served, I will take an oath to the Constitution.”
The two men then went back and forth as Baier pressed the allegations.
Mike Rogers speaks to the media following a debate against El-Sayed in Southfield, Michigan on October 21, 2026.
“I’m not interested,” El-Sayed said, once again cutting Baier off.
“Don’t you want to go back?” Baier pushed.
“You’re going to take that out of context,” El-Sayed responded. “Don’t be Rogers’ campaign. Be a journalist,” he added.
“I am,” Baier insisted.
El-Sayed once again disavowed the Muslim Brotherhood.
“So as a journalist, if you ask the question of my allegiance to the Constitution, I have never been a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. I never will be. I wish to serve the United States. I wish to swear an oath to the Constitution that every senator has sworn to,” he said.
“If the issue of my faith is the issue, as Mike Rogers wants it to be, I think it is sad and unbecoming of him – and frankly the President of the United States – to make this an issue because under our Constitution you have guaranteed the right to pray as you choose to pray.
El-Sayed has repeatedly quashed rumors that he has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.
El-Sayed won a hotly contested primary for the seat currently held by incumbent Democrat Gary Peters.
Footage of a young man named “Tommy” challenging El-Sayed to disavow the Muslim Brotherhood went viral last weekend, with El-Sayed completely dismantling the premise of the question.
Tommy turned out to be Thomas Teepell, a former staffer for Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri and an unsuccessful Republican candidate for governor of Kansas.
During the debate in the Michigan Senate on Wednesday, Rogers again asserted that El-Sayed never disavowed the Muslim Brotherhood, although El-Sayed did so during the exchange with Teepell a few days earlier.
Recent reports have found no evidence that El-Sayed is affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood. He has repeatedly denied any connection
These claims stem from social media posts made by El-Sayed’s ex-half-sister, Eman Abdelhadi.
She claimed that “the family had long been part of the Muslim Brotherhood” but that the group had “navigated the political sphere poorly and destructively.” She also posted that her mother engaged in “activism” with the group in the 1970s.
El-Sayed’s parents separated when he was 3, and he did not grow up with his mother or half-sister.
El-Sayed has a narrow lead in some polls, with several giving him a lead of just one or two points.
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