{"id":15775,"date":"2026-07-24T14:37:13","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T09:37:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=15775"},"modified":"2026-07-24T14:37:13","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T09:37:13","slug":"hillary-scholten-refuses-to-say-shell-back-abdul-el-sayed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=15775","title":{"rendered":"Hillary Scholten Refuses to Say She&#8217;ll Back Abdul El-Sayed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"post-body\">\n<p>Rep. <strong>Hillary Scholten<\/strong> (D-MI) went viral this week after she excoriated fellow Michigan Democrat <strong>Abdul El-Sayed<\/strong> and his campaigning with<strong> Hasan Piker<\/strong>, who in the past said \u201cAmerica deserved 9\/11.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Scholten made the comments in a Wednesday night interview with CNN\u2019s <strong>Jake Tapper,<\/strong> who asked her if she would refuse to endorse El-Sayed, should he win his Democratic Party primary for U.S. Senate in her state. Scholten, who is supporting<a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/tag\/abdul-el-sayed\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"> El-Sayed\u2019s<\/a> opponent Rep. <strong>Haley Stevens<\/strong>, made clear \u201cI cannot, I will not even come close to being associated with comments\u201d like those from Piker.<\/p>\n<p>After <a href=\"https:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/media\/michigan-democrat-accuses-abdul-el-sayed-deeply-sexist-attacks-female-political-rivals\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">saying<\/a> that El-Sayed has a history of \u201cdeeply sexist attacks\u201d against women, Scholten tied him to fellow progressive<strong> Graham Platner.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cLet\u2019s consider who\u2019s on Abdul El-Sayed\u2019s team, right? He\u2019s been endorsed by Senator <strong>Bernie Sanders<\/strong>, who also was supporting Graham Platner, who had, you know, a deeply problematic record with women \u2014 credibly accused by multiple sources of sexual assault, even rape in one case. Rape, in one case. Abdul El-Sayed and Graham Platner campaigned together,\u201d Scholten said during the interview, a point which gained a lot of attention online.<\/p>\n<p>Semafor\u2019s political reporter <strong>Dave Weigel<\/strong> shared a clip of the interview and <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/daveweigel\/status\/2080360203669664232\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">added<\/a>, \u201cEarlier in the interview, Scholten said: \u2018Abdul El-Sayed and Graham Platner campaigned together. They fundraised together.\u2019 They never campaigned together. El-Sayed and Platner did two (total) split send fundraising emails.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Scholten continued:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>They fundraised together. You know, another thing that I find\u2026 potentially even more concerning than some of the sexist comments are, you know, some of the things that Abdul has said and gone out of his way to associate himself with when it comes to what some might see as deeply un-American comments \u2014 you know, choosing to campaign with Hasan Piker, who said America deserved September 11th. Sure, he went on to disavow those comments, but I\u2019m telling you, nobody on my team would ever, you know, come even close to making a comment like that.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\u201cSo will you \u2014 will you not back him if he wins the primary? Will you not support him?\u201d Tapper pressed.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou know, Jake, I think that it\u2019s really important to make a clear distance from yourself and these comments. And that\u2019s exactly what I\u2019ve been doing in this race. I cannot, I will not even come close to being associated with comments like \u2018America deserved September 11,\u2019\u201d Scholten replied.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWell, he would say \u2014 Dr. El-Sayed would say \u2014 \u2018Well, I didn\u2019t say that, and I don\u2019t think Hasan Piker said it, and I don\u2019t agree with everything everybody I campaign with has said,\u2019\u201d Tapper pushed back.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut here\u2019s the critical point on that: he might say that, right, and sure, I give him \u2014 I give them \u2014 credit for disavowing it after the fact. But the reality is, he also didn\u2019t have to choose to campaign with Hasan Piker,\u201d Scholten replied, adding:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>To me, that\u2019s a non-starter. Saying something like \u201cAmerica deserved September 11\u201d \u2014 call me a patriot, Jake, but saying \u201cnever forget\u201d still means something to me, right? 2,977 people lost their lives on September 11th. In the one year following September 11th, 180,000 men and women signed up to serve our country to protect us after what happened that day \u2014 many of them my age.<\/p>\n<p>We went on to see over 58,000 Purple Heart veterans, almost 6,000 who lost their lives, right? It\u2019s important to focus on these facts because you\u2019re not just going to brush aside comments like that, right? Comments that are deeply, deeply un-American.<\/p>\n<p>And as people are talking about right now, like the rise of the DSA \u2014 it\u2019s not so problematic because, you know, they want better healthcare, right, for people. They want better environmental protections. What\u2019s so concerning to a lot of people in West Michigan, I hear, is that we\u2019re not willing to be tough on comments like that.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>\u201cDo you worry about the direction of your party?\u201d Tapper followed up.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI absolutely do. And I think that condoning behavior like this from candidates like Abdul El-Sayed is taking us in a direction that we don\u2019t want to go as a party. I don\u2019t need $20 million to study why young men stopped voting for the Democratic Party. Look at the message that we\u2019re sending to our veterans if we\u2019re willing to embrace or even brush aside comments like that. I would never stand on a stage or be at a rally with someone like Hasan Piker because he chose to say comments like that,\u201d Scholten concluded.<\/p>\n<p>Watch the clip above via CNN.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>New: The Mediaite One-Sheet &#8220;Newsletter of Newsletters&#8221;<\/strong><br \/>Your daily summary and analysis of what the many, many media newsletters are saying and reporting. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/subscribe\">Subscribe now!<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script type=\"text\/javascript\">\n!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s){if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\nn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;\nn.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\nt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,\ndocument,'script','https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Rep. Hillary Scholten (D-MI) went viral this week after she excoriated fellow Michigan Democrat Abdul El-Sayed and his campaigning with Hasan Piker, who in the past said \u201cAmerica deserved 9\/11.\u201d Scholten made the comments in a Wednesday night interview with CNN\u2019s Jake Tapper, who asked her if she would refuse to endorse El-Sayed, should he&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15776,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.mediaite.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/hil.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsweek-trending"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}