Michigan Democrat Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed spent the 25th anniversary of 9/11 pretending to mourn the loss of nearly 3,000 people killed in the terrorist attack.
“Today on 9/11, we remember and honor the lives that were taken from us in a terrible act of terrorism,” El-Sayed said in a statement. “Nothing can justify the murder of innocent civilians. Nothing.”
But in the lead-up to the anniversary, El-Sayed campaigned with many groups and individuals linked to terrorist groups and others who supported the attacks. His most prominent campaign spokesman, radical streamer Hasan Piker, has claimed America “deserved 9/11,” and El-Sayed appeared on stage with an individual who was named an unindicted co-conspirator of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing.
Mere days before the 25th anniversary, El-Sayed appeared at the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) Annual Convention on Sept. 5 in Detroit. El-Sayed’s father-in-law, Jukaku Tayeb, is a founder of ISNA, a group that the U.S. Department of Justice named an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation case (HLF) in which HLF and its leadership were convicted of funneling millions of dollars to Hamas. The U.S. government has also described the group as an “apparatus” within the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood.
At the opening of ISNA’s two-day event, whose theme was “Turmoiled America,” ISNA played an introduction video of comments from several event speakers including El-Sayed and Imam Siraj Wahhaj, the Washington Free Beacon reported. The latter was designated an unindicted co-conspirator in the World Trade Center bombing of 1993 and at one time blamed “Zionist forces” for the attack.
“I am ashamed of what America has become,” Wahhaj said in the clip. “Look at the newspaper every day, how America is going down.”
El-Sayed’s comment discussed his struggles as a junior in high school being a “kid with a funny name and an olive complexion” following the 9/11 attacks. El-Sayed faced many calls to drop out of the event due to its proximity to the 25-year anniversary of the attacks as well as the conspiracy theorists present at the event, but he attended regardless.
At an August event in Michigan’s most heavily populated Arab town, El-Sayed made an appearance with Imam Husham Al-Husainy, director of the Karbala Islamic Education Center at an event encouraging Dearborn residents to vote for Arab candidates on the ballot in Michigan.
Al-Husainy has an extensive history supporting terrorism. In 2006, he held a picture of the face of Hezbollah leader Nasrallah while on stage at a Karbala event. Al-Husainy has also refused to condemn Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, instead expressing his support for the group in an interview with Sean Hannity. In a 2022 address, Al-Hussainy cheered the “light of the Islamic Republic of Iran” spreading into Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and Yemen.
In another event earlier this year, El-Sayed spoke at the grand opening of the Dearborn Heights branch of the Islamic Institute of America (IIA), appearing alongside the group’s founder and senior religious leader Imam Hassan Qazwini, who endorsed El-Sayed in July.
Qazwini is the son of Ayatollah Morteza Qazwini, a man associated with Kata’ib Hezbollah, which the U.S. State Department designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization in 2009. Hassan Qazwini has appeared with other Democratic Socialist candidates, namely, Bernie Sanders, and has a record of making anti-American and antisemitic statements. At a Sanders presidential campaign rally in 2020, Qazwini claimed the terrorist group ISIS is “somehow connected to Israel.”
Campaigning with terrorist sympathizers is nothing new for El-Sayed. During his 2018 gubernatorial campaign, he attempted the same tactics and campaigned at numerous Muslim facilities while partnering with terrorist supporters.
In May 2018, El-Sayed hosted a fundraising dinner at the Islamic Center of America (ICA), a group that has ties to supporting Hezbollah and Iran-aligned individuals and has held memorials for Hezbollah terrorists. El-Sayed also appeared at the Islamic Center of Detroit (ICD) in October 2018 at the group’s Reconnect Conference, organized in partnership with the Muslim Youth of the ICD.
El-Sayed’s gubernatorial campaign reportedly received funding from Imam Mohammad Ali Elahi, spiritual leader of the Islamic House of Wisdom (IHW) and former head of the Islamic Navy Association of the Islamic Republic of Iran. IHW has been criticized for receiving grants from the Alavi Foundation, which has faced federal scrutiny for its alleged ties to the Iranian government.
Supporting terrorists is not just a political bit for El-Sayed, either. It runs in the family. His father-in-law is a founder of ISNA, and both his mother and sister have ties to supporting terrorists.
President Trump recently called out El-Sayed’s mother’s alleged work with a group that provided “direct financial support” for several terrorists and terrorist groups, including Osama bin Laden, the Taliban, and Hamas.
His half sister, Emam Abdelhadi, a left-wing associate professor at the University of Chicago, has praised the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks and issued an “October 7th blessing” in a 2024 video memorializing the event. Abdelhadi, who is El-Sayed’s half-sister on his mother’s side, was arrested in August on a felony charge for her role in an anti-ICE riot.
Abdul wants voters to forget his ties to terrorists. But spending months and years campaigning with and supporting those who cheer the deaths of thousands of Americans is something voters should never forget.
Editor's Note: Do you enjoy Townhall's conservative reporting exposing the radical left and woke media? Support our work so we can keep bringing you the truth.
Join Townhall VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.
Editor's Note: Do you enjoy Townhall's conservative reporting exposing the radical left and woke media? Support our work so we can keep bringing you the truth.
Join Townhall VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.
Join the Conversation
VIP members get the ability to comment on articles.