Division within the Democratic Party over Israel was highlighted in Michigan Tuesday when left-wing podcaster Hasan Piker campaigned with Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed at Michigan State University and the University of Michigan.
El-Sayed’s decision to campaign with Piker has drawn scrutiny from across the political spectrum given comments the popular streamer has made on the Israel-Hamas war.
Piker, who has over three million followers on the streaming platform Twitch, is known for marathon streaming sessions that can last upwards of 10 hours. He has amassed a significant following of young, progressive men.
Julia Demaree Nikhinson / AP 
In a brief interview with CBS News prior to the MSU event, El-Sayed responded to the controversy surrounding his appearance with Piker.
“The fact that this is the controversy to me, says everything we need to know about what D.C. focuses on. I don’t pay much attention to D.C. I pay attention to Michigan,” El-Sayed said. “Here in Michigan, people can’t afford to fill up a tank because of the war that’s being fought out of D.C. and have to suffer. The president is tweeting about his genocidal fantasies in Iran. He’s tweeting about the drapes in a building. So at the end of the day, like, I just don’t take my cues from there. We’re focused on reaching out to people who feel locked out of our politics because they cannot afford the basic needs of a dignified life.”
El-Sayed is facing two other Democrats in the August primary, Rep. Haley Stevens and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow.
McMorrow, like El-Sayed, has referred to the war in Gaza as a genocide and has said she will not accept campaign donations from the pro-Israel group American Israel Public Affairs Committee, better known as AIPAC. Stevens, however, is supported by AIPAC and has advocated for ongoing relations between the U.S. and Israel in videos she’s appeared in for AIPAC.
Stevens and McMorrow, along with the Anti-Defamation League and center-left organization Third Way, have criticized El-Saye’s association with Piker.
Stevens called El-Sayed’s decision to campaign with Piker “unacceptable,” and McMorrow told Jewish Insider, “[Piker] is not somebody that you should be campaigning with at a moment when there is clearly a lot of pain and trauma across our state.”
In the same interview, McMorrow said that Piker is “not entirely different from somebody like Nick Fuentes,” as he is “somebody who says extremely offensive things in order to generate clicks and views and followers.”
Piker has said the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attack against Israel was the “direct consequence” of actions by the Israeli and U.S. government. And during a May 2024 stream, Piker said that it “doesn’t matter” if people were sexually assaulted during the Oct. 7 attack as it does not change his view on the dynamics of the conflict.
Piker Tuesday pushed back on Democrats who he says have criticized him amid the Iran war.
“A lot of prominent Democrats spent the last two weeks, instead of developing the appropriate response to Donald Trump’s mania, chose to repeat what corporate donors and foreign lobbyists and big donors had told themselves, including, but not limited to, Abdul El-Sayad’s opponents, Mallory McMorrow and Haley Stevens. And that’s exactly what’s wrong with politics in this day and age,” Piker told attendees at the Michigan State rally.
Michigan has the largest concentration of Arab, Muslim and Palestinian Americans in the U.S. In the 2020 election, former President Joe Biden won 69% of Dearborn, a city with an Arab-majority population. In 2024, however, former Vice President Kamala Harris carried just 36% of the Dearborn vote.
Progressive Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib, whose district includes Dearborn, and moderate Democratic Rep. Debbie Dingell, whose district includes Ann Arbor, also attended the University of Michigan event. Organizers said the two events drew a combined 1,200 people.
Some attendees of the MSU event told CBS News that while they had come to see Piker, they were glad that El-Sayed was campaigning with him.
Joey Conroy, a sophomore at Michigan State University, told CBS News he wouldn’t support candidates who accept money from AIPAC.
“I think a lot of people have not been comfortable speaking out against things that are happening abroad like in Iran and Palestine, actions I don’t support as a voter,” Conroy explained. “So, seeing people who will speak out against that, like El-Sayed, speaking out directly about what’s happening in Palestine, is really encouraging and I want to support more of that.”
El-Sayed, a progressive who’s been endorsed by independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna of California, has long criticized U.S. funding for Israel and Democratic leaders like Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who continue to support it.
Attendee Anna Gonzales, of Grand Rapids, Michigan, said it was a “smart decision” for El-Sayed to campaign with Piker because it will engage more left-wing voters.
“I think one of the mistakes that the Democratic Party makes is estranging the left,” Gonzales told CBS News. “They really cater toward more moderate voters and a lot of pro-Israel supporters. I think that they lose a lot of us on the left when they do that.”
Gonzales’ son, Ezekiel, who is in his late 20s, added that it seems as if Democratic leaders are hesitant to engage with left-wing streamers and creators like Piker, but at the same time the party is pushing Democrats to engage more with conservatives.
“When we have people more willing to go on Theo Von’s podcast and Joe Rogan’s and capitulate to the right, and then we see people like Corey Booker say, ‘I draw the line at Hasan Piker,’ it really shows the priority of the Democratic Party and the establishment on the left not wanting to be progressive,” Ezekiel said.
Tuesday’s events were held before President Trump announced a two-week ceasefire with Iran, which came hours after Mr. Trump had threatened that “a whole civilization will die tonight.”
