El-Sayed holds 7-point lead in Michigan Senate race survey

Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed posted a 7-point advantage over his GOP opponent, Rep. Mike Rogers, in a new survey released Tuesday.

The Suffolk University poll found that 47 percent of likely Michigan voters backed El-Sayed, while 40 percent said they supported Rogers in the November contest.

Eighty-one percent of Democrats backed El-Sayed and 90 percent of Republicans supported Rogers, according to the survey.

Additionally, the Democratic candidate performed better among younger voters, female voters and Black voters. The GOP nominee holds an advantage among older voters, male voters and white voters.

Suffolk University Political Research Center Director David Paleologos noted that El-Sayed also performed better with voters not affiliated with a political party and has 16-point advantage among this particular demographic.

“Abdul El-Sayed is popular with unaffiliated Michigan voters,” Paleologos said in a statement. “That, in addition to the unpopularity of recent tariffs imposed on Canada and voter unhappiness over the possibility of data centers in Michigan, has caused a massive shift to Democratic candidates among independents compared to 2024.”

The Democrat has ramped up his campaign efforts in recent weeks ahead of the midterm election, which is now only six weeks away.

El-Sayed traveled to Washington, D.C. last week to meet with senators on Capitol Hill, and former Vice President Kamala Harris is scheduled to appear at a campaign event in Detroit alongside him on Tuesday.

In a statement to The Hill’s broadcast partner, NewsNation, El-Sayed said he hopes to broaden his coalition to include voters who supported Harris in the 2024 presidential election.

“She speaks to a community of people I really want to make sure we are speaking to,” El-Sayed said. “I want to be able to build the kind of coalition that includes Vice President Harris, that includes Bernie Sanders, and that brings folks together around what we can build together.”

The Senate hopeful has pulled slightly ahead of Rogers in recent polling, scoring a 3-point advantage in a Washington Post survey and a 2-point advantage in an Emerson College poll earlier this month.

The Suffolk University survey included responses from 500 likely Michigan voters between September 16 and 20 with a margin of error of approximately 4.4 percentage points.