Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) said on Wednesday that he believes Abdul El-Sayed’s victory in the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate in Michigan has put the state in play for Republicans in November. 

Fetterman made the comments in an interview with Jewish Insider in the hours after Rep. Haley Stevens (D-MI) conceded to El-Sayed in what was a competitive and contentious primary. The Pennsylvania Democrat said he expects El-Sayed will struggle to reach moderate voters without distancing himself from antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker and his record of extremist comments, including remarks that America deserved 9-11 which Republicans are already revisiting in campaign ads.

“He will quickly discover a primary is a much different situation in this state [than the general election], when you’re accountable for winning the other side. I can’t wait to see him campaign for the general. I have got my popcorn for that,” Fetterman told JI. “Will he denounce Hasan Piker? Because Piker is already calling moderates ‘Islamophobic pieces of s***.’ Will he campaign with him? Will he denounce his views? I am daring him to continue to campaign with Hasan Piker now.”

“Think about how volatile a guy like Piker is,” Fetterman said. “He’s already gone off and exploded because El-Sayed was saying how now we have to mend fences.”

Fetterman called El-Sayed “a dream for a Republican candidate,” adding that he would spend millions on political advertisements highlighting El-Sayed’s relationship with Piker if he were the GOP candidate in the race. 

Fetterman argued that El-Sayed’s close margin of victory over Stevens — less than one point — shows that his win is not indicative of a shift in the state’s overall electorate. 

“I don’t know why El-Sayed described this as a big movement. He thinks that this was an incredible win and that’s just not the case,” he told JI. “Just the opposite — he barely won by 14,000 votes.”

“He really ran the under-four mile politically, palling around with a dude that loves Hamas and thinks America deserved 9/11,” he added. “I mean, will that stick? We’ll see, but overall, this takes largely what had been a safe seat for Democrats and absolutely puts it in play now. Mike Rogers barely lost to [Sen.] Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) [in 2022].”

Asked if he’ll consider endorsing former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI), El-Sayed’s Republican opponent in the contest, Fetterman said, “I’m not making any endorsements in this race.”

The Pennsylvania Democrat expressed skepticism that El-Sayed would be able to win over pro-Israel and Jewish voters in November, specifically pointing to his defense of the perpetrator of the violent attack on Temple Israel in the Detroit suburbs earlier this year. “Nothing justifies the heinous attack that we saw on Temple Israel,” Fetterman said.

“Every other word out of his mouth is AIPAC, AIPAC, AIPAC. Imagine what that must look like to a Jewish voter,” Fetterman said of El-Sayed. “Essentially he has defined his race by opposing Jewish money or saying Israel is the aggressor, and he aligns himself with some of the worst people.”

“I’m not a member of the Jewish community, but I can’t imagine how anyone could vote for him in good conscience,” he continued. “How could a Jewish voter in Michigan vote for a guy that refused to condemn a terrorist that crashed his car into a synagogue to kill 150 Jewish children? That’s disqualifying, and it’s appalling.”

Fetterman argued that, “This is a guy that has similar views to Piker. We all know why Abdul El-Sayed was sad after we incinerated Iranian leadership. Remember what Hamas has done to defenseless Israeli and Jewish civilians on 10/7. Piker is the guy that cheers for that organization. I don’t know how you are able to reconcile that.”

Fetterman also took aim at Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) for his endorsements of El-Sayed in Michigan and failed Senate candidate Graham Platner in Maine, who Sanders withdrew his support for after he was accused of sexual assault. The Pennsylvania senator, who has publicly sparred with all three men in recent months, criticized Sanders’ candidate choices as detrimental to Democrats retaking control of the Senate. 

“Bernie Sanders is not flipping seats,” Fetterman said. “He is trying to put volatile and terrible candidates into otherwise more safe kinds of opportunities for Democrats.”

He went on to add that he does not plan to endorse the Democrat in the race, while noting that El-Sayed would likely not want his support. 

“I can’t ever endorse him, not to think he’d even want mine, and not because he’s called me an asshole or because I’m an ogre that belongs on a pike,” Fetterman said, referring to comments El-Sayed made about him earlier this month. “It’s because he’d have to renounce people like Piker and some of those extreme community leaders that were very much involved with standing with Iran and engaged in rhetoric that describes America as evil. They’re just essentially anti-American people, ironically, while they are living in our country.”