Abdul El-Sayed, a Democratic candidate for U.S. Senate in Michigan, once accused the state’s police of profiling in a campaign speech.
"We have a system of policing that seems to want to police on top of people rather than police with people," El-Sayed said during a gubernatorial bid in 2018 in an address before Harvard.
"The probability of closing a murder in Detroit is extremely low. And yet the cops will pick on you because you look a particular kind of way."
El-Sayed’s comments persist despite efforts to scrub his social media of posts championing criticisms against law enforcement, providing a look at his views on Michigan police that preceded the widespread criticisms of police that would emerge in the "Defund the Police" movement.
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Despite rejecting political language that pits "left" against "right" and "progressives" against "conservatives," El-Sayed has raised eyebrows nationally for messaging that pushes the edges of his party’s messaging on key issues.
Among other notable positions, El-Sayed has made increasing the role of government a key part of his campaign. In addition to calling for lowering housing costs, he’s advocated for Medicare for All, opposes corporate tax carve-outs and supports tuition-free access to higher education.
He’s also called for the abolition of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
But, like most Democrats, El-Sayed has been backtracking from criticisms about local police — retreating from the "defund the police" stance that rose to prominence in the wake of the death of George Floyd in 2020. Although the movement rallied Democrats around increased accountability measures for law enforcement officers, it became a political liability following crime spikes in cities that embraced the idea like Minneapolis, Portland and Seattle.
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El-Sayed has taken pains to clear ties to the movement on his social media.
"Most major US cities spend WAY TOO MUCH on police departments to police poverty & WAY TOO LITTLE on public schools, health departments, recreation departments, & housing to eliminate poverty. Fixing that is what the #Defund movement is about," El-Sayed wrote in one June 2020 post on X, just several weeks after the death of George Floyd.
He has since deleted the post and declined to explain why he removed them.
Although many of his posts about defunding the police have been removed, some of El-Sayed’s comments from his gubernatorial bid demonstrate that his concern about police behavior preceded George Floyd’s death.
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"We incarcerate 11% more people in the state of Michigan than the national average. We’re way better at violating people’s bodies for petty crime than we are in policing violations of their bodies for serious crime," El-Sayed said in his Harvard address.
El-Sayed’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.