DETROIT — Rep. Haley Stevens, the Michigan Democrat who narrowly lost her party’s Senate primary in August, endorsed Republican nominee Mike Rogers on Sunday, an extraordinary break with her party two days before an election that could help decide control of the Senate.
Stevens and Rogers arrived separately at Perfecting Church, a prominent Black church in the city, and attended Sunday morning services together. Afterward, Stevens posted a video online saying that Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic nominee who defeated her in the primary, had told her she was no longer welcome in his campaign and should stay away. “And that’s why I am endorsing Mike Rogers for the United States Senate today,” she said.
The move set off an exodus from her congressional office. “As of this morning, many members of our team have resigned, including myself,” Justin German, Stevens’ chief of staff for eight years, said in a statement Sunday.
“We are shocked and heartbroken by Congresswoman Stevens’ decision to support Mike Rogers,” German said, adding that he was speaking on behalf of the team “in wholeheartedly supporting Abdul El-Sayed for Senate.”
“I’m sorry people are upset,” Stevens told reporters outside the church as she stood alongside Rogers. “I understand that.”
She also said she was “still a very proud Democrat.”
Hours later, Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel wrote on X that Stevens “is not a current member of the Michigan Democratic Party, nor will she be in the future.”
President Donald Trump welcomed what he called “the big news” about Stevens endorsing Rogers and said he would “love to have her” join the Republican Party. “That was a big move, I think. Nobody expected that, but it’s a smart thing to do because El Sayed would destroy our country,” the president told reporters Sunday afternoon ahead of his rally appearance in Dubuque, Iowa.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called the endorsement “a despicable betrayal,” writing in a statement that Senate Democrats “are united in our support for Abdul El-Sayed.”
Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., whose retirement opened the seat, wrote in a statement that he was “extremely disappointed in Haley’s decision” and would vote for El-Sayed.
Sen. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., said she had avoided commenting on Stevens’ actions until now but that there was “simply too much at stake.” She wrote on X that “anyone who makes an election this important about themselves, and not Michiganders and our democracy, should think hard about whether they are serving the greater good.”
The endorsement is the most dramatic turn yet in a Senate race whose closing stretch has been dominated by tensions between Stevens and El-Sayed.
The two had been scheduled to campaign together Sunday at a get-out-the-vote event at another Detroit church with Rep. Jim Clyburn, D-S.C. — what would have been their first joint public appearance in months. Stevens had endorsed El-Sayed days after the August primary, and they appeared together at a unity breakfast that month, but they had not campaigned together since.
That event collapsed after Stevens issued a statement Friday calling on El-Sayed to publicly condemn an ad from Rebellion PAC — an outside group not affiliated with his campaign — that linked high grocery prices to U.S. aid to Israel. She also knocked El-Sayed for his own past comments about Israel, writing that the ad “did not invent its argument” but instead reflected El-Sayed’s rhetoric on the campaign trail. He could begin his effort to remove money from politics, she wrote, “by getting Israel out of his explanation for everything Michigan cannot afford.”
El-Sayed responded in a statement of his own, writing that Stevens “seems intent on relitigating a primary that ended three months ago.”
Following the back-and-forth, El-Sayed’s campaign asked Stevens to stay away from its events for the rest of the race, a Democratic source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal conversations, told MS NOW.
After a rally Saturday in Sterling Heights, El-Sayed pushed back when MS NOW asked whether he condemned Rebellion PAC’s ad.
“You guys love to play the ‘condemn’ game,” he said. “I’ve already been clear that that ad was not made by me, and I do not agree with the contents of that ad.”
Stevens responded in a statement that did not mention El-Sayed by name.
“I was glad to see our senate nominee say he does not agree with the content of the vile Rebellion PAC ad which claimed Israel and Jews were to blame for the high costs of groceries,” she wrote.
“Whenever anyone tries to set us against each other, we have an obligation to stand up and fight back. This is what our constituents deserve from those of us in elected leadership,” she continued. “Go vote!”
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