Why is Donald Trump resorting to Islamophobia days before the midterms? Because he has no better argument to win over voters, Abdul El-Sayed told the What A Day podcast.
As this
very newsletterasserted a few days ago, “Donald Trump’s desperation is showing.” And boy, oh boy, has he only grown increasingly paranoid that the Republican Party will get stomped in the midterms next week, which would take away much of his power during his final term in office. From trying toprevent blue statesfrom counting votes, tocampaigning with washed-upfootball players, Trump is grasping at straws in a frantic scramble to stave off a total catastrophe for the GOP.
Perhaps nothing is more indicative of Trump’s desperation than his recent shift toward incredibly appalling Islamaphobic attacks against one of the most promising Democratic candidates running for Senate: Michigan’s Abdul El-Sayed.
Trump attacked the mild-mannered, 41-year-old physician as a “jihadist” who should “have to go through a metal detector before he’s allowed to go into the Senate,”
duringa rally this week. Vice President JD Vance𝕏also accusedEl-Sayed of engaging in “explicitly anti-white racial hatred.” When Vance likened the candidate to a weasel, El-Sayed clapped back, quipping that he’s actually “a fucking wolverine.”
To El-Sayed, who’s leading Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) in
the latest poll, the racist attacks are a sign that Republicans have nothing else to run on.
“They’re saying that they have no real answer for the real issues in your life,” El-Sayed told the
▶What A Day▶podcast today. “They’re saying they have nothing to say about your gas prices, or the price of your groceries, or your ability to see a doctor, or whether or not you can breathe clean air or drink clean water in the United States of America. They’re telling you that the best they’ve got is to distract you with red meat.”
**El-Sayed said that regardless of the president’s attacks, he wants to take the opposite approach: **To try and show Republicans why voting for him is in their own interest.
El-Sayed’s campaign has largely focused on fixing issues like housing and affordability, rather than pick fights with the president. El-Sayed has also
openly courtedMake America Healthy Again voters, without all the loopy pseudo-science of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
That’s part of his strategy to win over voters who may have once supported MAGA politicians, but have grown disillusioned since Trump took office again.
“Our politics have to be about inviting people to make the best decision in the future,” El-Sayed explained. “People getting taken advantage of is not entirely their fault. Now, I wish they would have made a different decision. But I can’t spend my time trying to indict people for one bad decision, when I could be spending my time inviting them to make the next good decision.”
*Trump is a “very good con man,” El-Sayed told *** What a Day. But the president can’t hide the fact that he promised he would drain the swamp, only to become “the biggest alligator in the swamp.”
** Former swiss model Beatrice Keul accused **Donald Trump of raping her in a New York City hotel in the 1990s, according to a new report released by Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee. Keul described the incident as “brutal,”
** FBI agents raided the home of a Los Angeles billionaire **today as part of a probe into former Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell. Swalwell previously used the house to hold political events and
** Israel saw its highest early voter turnout in decades** today as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s political future remains uncertain. Netanyahu seemed worried this morning. “Higher-than-usual voter turnout in the Arab sector compared to the low turnout of right-wing voters,” he
** The massive arch that Trump plans to build in **the nation’s capital would cast a shadow on parts of Arlington National Cemetery in the morning on 284 days every year, according to a
** A 39-year-old mentally ill man has been detained** by ICE since January, even though documents show that he was born in the United States, the Associated Press reports. The man told agents that he was born in Jamaica and illegally entered the U.S. in 2009. His claim is a grand delusion, which is caused by paranoid schizophrenia, according to reports by medical examiners filed in court.
** The FDA has inspected about 2 percent of Mexican facilities** that ship food to the United States since 2009, according to the
** Lawyers for James Comey rejected the **Trump administration’s allegations, contained in a third criminal prosecution attempt unveiled yesterday, that the former FBI director leaked classified information a decade ago. “Well, they’re back — again,” Comey said in
** NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani occasionally hosts pickup **basketball games with his friends in the private New York Police Department gym. “The mayor’s group usually appears around 10 or 11 p.m., entering discreetly through the loading dock which leads to the gym stairs,” Politico writes. If this is being considered a “scandal,” I think Mamdani is doing all right.
** The full schedule of panels at Crooked Con** is now live. Get your
** Huge groups of volunteers are organizing across the country** to monitor polling locations on Election Day and report sightings of ICE agents. The Department of Homeland Security continues to claim that it won’t send agents to the polls, but remember what their boss said only a few months ago? “I’d do anything necessary to make sure we have honest elections,” Donald Trump
** A federal judge temporarily blocked Trump **from closing the public golf course or cutting down more trees at East Potomac Park in D.C. as he tries to build a championship-level course. Trump’s team previously infuriated Judge Ana Reyes by claiming that it had felled 400 trees in the park for routine maintenance and
** Dog trainers are barking at each other on social media **as they debate whether or not to give their pups treats. “It’s all treats, treats, treats, so help me God,” one Los Angeles-based trainer who handled Liza Minnelli’s dog told the
** I chuckled several times while reading this fun feature** about the dating lives of single boomer ladies and their experiences dating men who didn’t quite meet their standards. This quote, from a woman who had an underwhelming experience with a younger man, is iconic: “I said, ‘From now on, they have to have been born when Kennedy was shot.’”
Rolling Stone** dropped its list of the best 200 rock songs** of the 21st century, and per usual, it’s ripe for debate. That said, I approve of their top song:
