Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is taking a direct swipe at Muslim extremist candidate Abdul El-Sayed ahead of a critical Michigan race that could decide control of the Senate.
The Democrat doyenne undercut El-Sayed and his Muslim-brotherhood-from-another-motherhood Zohran Mamdani on Donny Deutsch’s On Brand podcast.
"When you say Israel doesn't have the right to be a Jewish state, that's antisemitic as far as I'm concerned with all that," Deutsch explained.
He identified Mamdani and El-Sayed, tamely describing their vitriol as “concerning.”
"No, it's more than concerning," she shot back. "It's wrong. It's wrong. And it isn't a reflection of the Democrats in the Congress of the United States."
🚨 Pelosi rips Abdul El-Sayed, says his views on Israel are "more than concerning":
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) October 30, 2026
“This new person in Michigan, we’ll see if he gets elected.” pic.twitter.com/zRtjdLvfPx
She wasn’t done.
"This new person in Michigan, we'll see if he gets elected to the Congress. But the mayor, bless his heart, I hope he succeeds as mayor, but I don't agree with some of the things he has said."
Pelosi called on House Democrats to distance themselves from such statements.
While the former Speaker didn’t drop rhetorical bombs on El-Sayed the way that Hamas likes to drop actual ones on Israeli schoolchildren, her subtle criticism has disproportionate weight due to the political timing and the way Democrats of her ilk always stick together.
Something is different with radical Democrats’ discomfort with Islamo-communist extremists like El Sayed. It is difficult to play the “identity politics” game when your party is attacking one of the most persecuted minorities in world history: Jews.
It’s enough to make astute observers of politics sit up and take notice that Democrats don’t really care about identity politics except to the extent that it gains them political power.
It’s a chessboard calculation based on demographics, at the end of the day, not a moral commitment to treating people the right way — that is to say, equally regardless of race, religion, gender, sexual orientation, or ethnicity.
The modern Democrat Party doesn’t believe in any of that. Don’t let them fool you.
If the Left’s hatred of the “All Lives Matter” response during the BLM riots didn’t convince you that these aren’t actually “liberals” that we are dealing with, nothing will.
So, it shouldn’t surprise anyone that the Democrat Party is turning against Jewish Americans after it abandoned Asian Americans and has flat-out demonized white Americans according to their imaginary “privilege.”
As RedState's Nick Arama reported Monday, Rebellion PAC, a political organization co-founded by The Young Turks commentator Cenk Uygur, released an advertisement portraying American grocery shoppers blaming U.S. support for Israel for their inability to afford food.
The advertisement features a couple discussing grocery prices before the woman tells her partner:
"Honey, you're going to have to put those eggs back. They like eggs, but we have to set that $7 aside for killing Palestinians."
The advertisement also attacks Republican Senate nominee Mike Rogers for his support of Israel, suggesting that he prioritizes Israeli officials over American constituents.
That message drew immediate condemnation, including from Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI), whom El-Sayed defeated in the Democrat primary.
"This type of fearmongering about Israel is wrong. It is not a winning strategy for any state. It does nothing to help Michigan Democrats win up and down the ballot in eight days," Stevens declared.
Rep. Dan Goldman (D-NY) went considerably further, demanding that El-Sayed personally condemn the advertisement.
"If @AbdulElSayed truly means what he says about treating the Jewish community as he would treat his own children, then he would immediately condemn this dangerous ad as outrageously antisemitic and demand that it be taken down. If not, then he's full of shit," Goldman posted.
El-Sayed's campaign responded by distancing itself from the advertisement, saying it was "not affiliated in any way with the Abdul for Senate campaign."
"No one speaks for Abdul but himself and his campaign," a spokesperson said.
The advertisement was produced by an outside political organization, not the candidate's campaign. But the ad illustrates why Democrats are being pressed to clarify where they stand on Israel, since their own allies produce antisemitic campaign ads.
Mamdani has previously declined to endorse Israel specifically as a Jewish state, arguing that governments should not privilege one religion over another.
"I think any state that privileges one religion over the other is one that I can't tell you I support, whether it be Israel or Saudi Arabia or anywhere else," Mamdani told ABC News in June.
El-Sayed has similarly expressed reservations about endorsing Israel's Jewish identity, suggesting that the concept conflicts with liberal values. But he’s not a liberal. This is a guy who is playing the useful idiots of the Democrat Party and has attacked states like Oklahoma for forbidding sharia law.
We hear a lot from Democrats about Israel because it is a Jewish state, but where is the similar criticism of Muslim states? According to the Pew Research Center, Muslims constitute a majority in approximately 53 countries and territories.
The Organization of Islamic Cooperation, meanwhile, has 57 member states, although not every member has a Muslim-majority population.
Many countries explicitly identify Islam as their official religion, including Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Iran. Many impose serious restrictions on the religious freedom of minorities, including Christians and Jews.
The advocacy organization Open Doors documents persecution of Christians around the world in its annual World Watch List. Its 2026 report identifies Somalia, Yemen, Sudan, Syria, Nigeria, Pakistan, Libya and Iran among the countries where Christians face particularly severe persecution at the hands of Muslims.
Open Doors documents that Muslims have killed thousands of Jews and Christians for their faith and have carried out thousands of attacks on churches and Christian properties.
Israel, meanwhile, is a parliamentary democracy in which Jewish, Muslim and Christian citizens participate in elections, practice their religions and serve in public institutions.
Pelosi's comments are also revealing for another reason. As Red State's Bob Hoge reported, the former Speaker was among approximately 40 House Democrats who did not sign a letter demanding that the Trump administration halt its immigration investigation into Rep. Ilhan Omar.
The letter, organized by Rep. Pramila Jayapal, got roughly 175 Democratic signatures. Pelosi wouldn’t sign on.
But with El-Sayed seeking a Senate seat, people who believe in religious freedom and other constitutional rights should be concerned about his rhetoric.
Why should the world's only Jewish-majority state be held to a standard that isn't consistently demanded of the dozens of countries where Islam is the majority religion?
It’s the kind of intellectual dishonesty that should cause someone to cross a politician’s name off of a list, not to mark a checkbox for him on Election Day.
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