WASHINGTON — Outgoing Rep. Haley Stevens roiled the critical Michigan Senate race with her shocking endorsement of Republican Mike Rogers, in a move that caught almost everyone by surprise.
The jaw-dropping last-minute endorsement by Stevens (D-Mich.), who came within a point of winning the Dem nod, took place with about half the votes still left to be cast in Michigan.
Some GOP insiders believe her decision, which came after months of her struggling over Abdul El-Sayed’s lefty agenda, could help Rogers eke out a win in a blue wave year, because it could persuade moderates to follow suit.
“I do not feel that Dr. El-Sayed is fit to be a US senator,” she explained on “The Scott Jennings Show” Monday.
Stevens recounted how she “tried to do everything right” and backed El-Sayed despite her many misgivings, but kept seeing more and more red flags pop up.
“Then the ads came out, ads blaming Jews for everything, and the Tucker [Carlson] ad,” she added, hinting that El-Sayed’s failure to push for those spots to get taken down was a red line for her.
The congresswoman described to the Free Press how she had an epiphany late Saturday, when she asked herself, “Wait a moment, what am I doing?” and reflected that she wasn’t “being honest with myself” about her uneasy support for El-Sayed.
“I’m at peace with this,” she later added about her backing of Rogers. “I’m not wrestling with this.”
The call to Rogers came early Sunday morning and wasn’t expected, though his campaign tried to signal it was “pretty open” to welcoming her as “Abdul pushed her out,” a source close to the campaign explained.
“We were all stunned,” a separate GOP aide involved in Michigan politics told The Post.
Democrats erupted in fury and outrage at the remarkable defection. Several lawmakers had reached out to Stevens right before she jumped ship, hearing rumors that she might withdraw her endorsement from El-Sayed.
Late last week, Stevens publicly ripped into El-Sayed over an ad by “Young Turks” co-founder Cenk Uygur that blamed high prices at the grocery store on Israel. El-Sayed said he disagreed with the ad but didn’t go as far as Stevens wanted in pushing for it to be taken down.
In response, El-Sayed then publicly gloated over how he defeated her in the primary, chiding that his “people-powered campaign defeated a historic $70M in outside spending from big corporations and AIPAC on behalf of Congresswoman Stevens.”
She was then disinvited from a planned unity event with El-Sayed.
“When you tell someone they’re not welcome somewhere, what are they supposed to do?” one source familiar with Stevens’ flip told The Post.
“She was uninvited. What did you think was going to happen? To quote Abdul El-Sayed, ‘Hurt people, hurt people.’”
Another Dem insider also told The Post that Stevens felt snubbed by her own party.
“It was personal,” the Michigan Democrat said.
Stevens felt she deserved more respect from the El-Sayed campaign, given how close she came to winning the primary and her influence with a certain bloc of voters. Meanwhile, El-Sayed wanted control over his closing argument event and is “not a guy with an oversized dose of humility,” according to a former senior member of Congress.
“No matter how big the race is or how consequential a situation might be, people are still in the ninth grade for the rest of their lives,” the ex-rep told The Post of the hurt feelings. “And they’re still subject to those insecurities and sensitivities.”
Before Stevens flipped, a multitude of Democrats claim to have made overtures to her, including “Squad” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), and others.
Some of them claimed to have received assurances from Stevens that she would still back El-Sayed after her public grumblings over the ad and the Democrats’ snubbing of her.
After her shocking endorsement, many began blaming her fiancé, Jason Turkish.
Former Michigan Gov. Jim Blanchard recounted having dinner with Stevens and Turkish last Friday.
“He was working her over. The way he was saying it was, ‘Everyone is disappointed in you, they did everything they could to help you and then immediately after you lose the primary, you endorsed him,’” Blanchard told Gongwer Michigan. “He was all distraught,” Blanchard, a key Stevens ally, added. “He was all strung out about Abdul. I let her know, he’s not a good influence.”
Turkish, who got engaged with Stevens shortly after her primary defeat, publicly backed Rogers days before she did. Group chats with former Stevens staffers, including ones with her in them, lit up after the endorsement, The Post was told.
Stevens’ former adviser Caitlin Legacki blamed Turkish for Stevens’ defection during a podcast episode, calling their relationship “absolutely toxic.”
“Her campaign staff is no longer around. Her official staff got cut out of all the decision-making,” Legacki added. “And they were as surprised as anyone by this. So she’s on an island with this guy.”
But Stevens publicly slapped down the theory that Turkish was the driving force behind her defection, telling Jennings that “any notion that I was forced into my decision is all more of the same.”
“We’re not the kind of women to be brainwashed,” Stevens’ mother, Maria Marcotte, who also backed Rogers, told The Post. “It’s misogyny.”
Stevens lost key staff in her congressional office, who quit in protest.
“I think this is really disappointing,” Stevens’ former campaign press secretary Joetta Appiah told The Post. “Haley Stevens is walking back on everything her campaign stood for.”
“Michiganders deserve better, and they need to stay focused on what matters, which is electing Abdul to the Senate to stand up to Donald Trump, hold his administration accountable, and fight to lower costs for Michiganders,” she added. “We cannot let this distract us from Tuesday.”
El-Sayed shrugged off Stevens’ defection as a distraction and irrelevant to Michiganders.
But she was just the latest Democrat defector to publicly say that El-Sayed is too much. Former Detroit-area Congressman Hansen Clarke (D-Mich.) backed Rogers, and former Michigan Democratic Party Chairman Lon Johnson said he won’t vote for El-Sayed.
“I am really proud to have her vote,” Rogers told reporters of Stevens on Sunday, hailing her as brave. “There are lots of Democrats that are joining us.”
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