A contentious primary debate on Tuesday night in Michigan’s key Senate race encapsulated the choices Democrats are facing across the country this year.
On one side, a progressive candidate vowed to upend a political system he said was overly reliant on corporate money. On the other, a moderate argued that she was better equipped to win the general election.
With the progressive, Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, leading in polls, his moderate rival, Representative Haley Stevens, wasted no time in going on the attack. She accused Dr. El-Sayed, a former public health official who has released a stream of cheeky social media videos, of caring more about his own publicity than about helping Michiganders. She argued that Republicans wanted him to win the primary because he would be easier to beat in November.
Dr. El-Sayed, in turn, argued against a system of corporate-backed politics that he argued Ms. Stevens was a mere cog in. He took digs at corporate interests or corporations at least 31 times during the hourlong debate in Grand Rapids — about once every two minutes.
“I am not trying to sell a book or a podcast,” Ms. Stevens said in her opening remarks, pounding the lectern for emphasis. “I’m only one on this stage who doesn’t have a talent agent trying to pitch me for paid speeches. And unlike my opponent, I’m not running at the first mic or camera I see.”
Dr. El-Sayed framed Ms. Stevens as a tool of corporate interests and of the pro-Israel lobby, suggesting that she would be little different from the Republican awaiting them in the general election, former Representative Mike Rogers, who is running unopposed in his primary.
“If Congresswoman Stevens makes it, or Mike Rogers wins, either way, Israel will win,” Dr. El-Sayed said. He added, referring to the influential American Israel Public Affairs Committee, “AIPAC is perfectly fine with either of my two opponents because they know that they will have a comfortable, reliable vote in the U.S. Senate.”
The televised debate was the first one-one-one clash between Dr. El-Sayed, who is backed by Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and Ms. Stevens, who is supported by Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the minority leader. The third candidate in the primary, State Senator Mallory McMorrow, suspended her campaign on Sunday after struggling in the polls.
Dr. El-Sayed and Ms. Stevens are vying to replace Senator Gary Peters, a Democrat who is not seeking a third term. For Democrats, retaining the Michigan seat is paramount to their hopes of winning a Senate majority. The party must hold all of its seats and flip at least four held by Republicans to take control of the chamber.
In one particularly sharp exchange, Dr. El-Sayed repeated his assertion that corporations that give money to super PACs to back Ms. Stevens are buying future support from her if she is elected. Ms. Stevens responded by citing Republican ads aiming to help Dr. El-Sayed in the primary.
“He won’t denounce the G.O.P. when they are funding his operation,” she said.
Dr. El-Sayed retorted sarcastically: “I’m sure everybody out there thinks that Republicans really want me to win this race. Sure.”
The clash between the two candidates has become increasingly hostile in recent days.
Each has announced websites purporting to show politically unhelpful facts about the other, and they have engaged in a war or words online after Dr. El-Sayed, in an interview with Semafor, accused Ms. Stevens of being “a suit with a large AIPAC bank account.” He added that “I hope maybe they find some way to teach her how to string together two coherent sentences.”
Ms. Stevens’s supporters accused Dr. El-Sayed of sexism for suggesting that she was not a competent orator. And Ms. Stevens, whose campaign is backed by more than $30 million in super PAC spending, a portion of which is coming from groups tied to AIPAC, has clearly been stung by his attacks.
While Dr. El-Sayed mostly kept his arguments focused on a political system he argued that his opponent represented, Ms. Stevens often attacked him by name and in personal terms.
She made no apologies for her approach in remarks to reporters after the debate.
“Abdul has spent this entire campaign attacking me,” Ms. Stevens said. “You got to engage when they’re just saying one negative thing after another. The record needs to get set straight. People need to know how I’m fighting for them and what I want to do. The guy said that I can’t string together two sentences. I mean, I think I did, tonight, pretty well.”
Dr. El-Sayed said after the debate that Ms. Stevens had shown “a level of desperation” during the debate.
“You know, when you got $40 million spent and you can’t seem to nudge the polls, it says something about the quality of candidate and the quality of argument,” he said.
Ms. Stevens, whose path to primary victory will probably rely on significant support from Black voters, took a shot during the debate at Dr. El-Sayed for what she called his tepid support of Vice President Kamala Harris during her unsuccessful 2024 presidential campaign.
At the end of a question about how to regulate artificial intelligence, Ms. Stevens tossed in a non sequitur.
“I worked really hard to make sure that Kamala Harris was going to get elected and that Donald Trump would be stopped, and my opponent did nothing,” she said.
Dr. El-Sayed responded, “I don’t know what Kamala Harris has to do with A.I.”
Dr. El-Sayed, whose father immigrated to Michigan from Egypt, did joke with reporters that he deserved “a handicap” on the debate because of the emotional stress of watching soccer teams from both the United States (“my No. 1 team”) and Egypt (“my No. 2 team”) be eliminated from the World Cup in the last two days.
But the smooth-talking progressive was momentarily stumped when asked if he could hold a lead better than Egypt, which led Argentina by two goals with 11 minutes remaining on Tuesday before giving up three goals in a devastating 3-2 defeat.
“Well,” he said, smiling, “you know, we’ll just — yes.”
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