AOC gives $1M to Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is donating $1 million to Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign as the Michigan progressive vies for the Senate in what pundits are calling a historic test of leftist appeal in purple states.

In the midst of a two-day swing through Detroit and the rural Upper Peninsula, AOC Friday said she wants to make sure she does everything possible to boost El-Sayed in his race to become the first Muslim and first Arab-American senator.

“I’m not waking up on November 4th wishing I did more,” Ocasio-Cortez said in a statement first reported by The New York Times. “I’m leaving everything I can on the field.”

The New York lawmaker campaigned alongside El-Sayed on his “Shouldn’t Be This Hard” bus tour. Ocasio-Cortez, who is said to be considering a run for Senate or even president in 2028, urged voters to tune out the ubiquitous GOP attack ads branding El-Sayed a left-wing radical or worse.

“They think is if they can make you scared of him, that means you won’t listen to him,” she said. “Because if people actually listen to him, they would hear someone that says we need to get big money out of politics, the minimum wage should be a living wage, healthcare should be a human right.”

AOC drew cheers as she introduced El-Sayed to sprawling crowds in a rural, Republican-leaning part of the state, a foray that reprised her groundbreaking 2025 barnstorming trip with Sen. Bernie Sanders through deep-red states like Idaho and Utah.

“They know if working people hear a man who understands our problems are not left and right, but top and bottom, they might like what they hear,” she said.

El-Sayed, who narrowly won a Democratic primary over moderate Rep. Haley Stevens, sounded like he’d be a strong supporter of whatever her next move might be.

“Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez has been a beacon in Congress for taking on the powerful on behalf of everyday people,” he said. “She’s shown all of us what courageous, sharp, values-driven leadership looks like.”

El-Sayed, who sometimes goes by the AOC-inspired acronym AES, has out-fundraised Republican rival Rep. Mike Rogers but is being out-spent by Republican super PACs including President Trump’s MAGA Inc.

He accused of being a rubber stamp for Trump’s unpopular right-wing agenda, especially the war with Iran.

“We’re going to grow our military budget to $1.5 trillion so we can buy more bombs and tanks and make more war?” he told a voter at a town hall. “That to me is insane.”

Polls say El-Sayed holds a narrow lead over Rogers in the fight for the seat now held by Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, who is retiring.

Democrats are hoping win back the Senate by flipping several GOP-held seats in deep-red seats, so holding all of the seats they now have is a must.