On a recent episode of The Tucker Carlson Show, Tucker Carlson and Saagar Enjeti described Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed’s campaign as “America first” and “literally Trumpian.”
Transcript
Saagar Enjeti: I watch his campaign now. It’s America First.
The amount of times he says he doesn’t—even when he talks about Israel, he says Israel is committing a genocide. But ultimately, I want to make sure that you don’t pay more for healthcare. I don’t want your tax dollars going abroad to fund this barbaric military. He stands in front of a giant American flag. It’s almost Trumpian in terms of a lot of—
Tucker Carlson: Literally Trumpian.
Saagar Enjeti: Exactly.
And so you see candidates like that, especially him. He will be the most interesting test case come November.
Tucker Carlson: Is he gonna win?
Saagar Enjeti: If I had to bet, which I don’t, I would probably bet that he’ll win.
Tucker Carlson: I would think so.
Saagar Enjeti: I think so too.
Tucker Carlson: Do you have any idea—not to fixate on Mike Rogers, who I know—but I mean, there’s no one who should be farther from a position of power than Mike Rogers.
Looking past the populist optics and the flag reveals a different story. El-Sayed’s platform is not America First or Trumpian.
The centerpiece is a promise of government-run healthcare from cradle to grave with no premiums, copays, or deductibles. That is a powerful slogan. But the math does not work without large tax increases. Funding a program of this size would require aggressive middle-class tax hikes.
Removing all costs for everyone in the country also explodes demand. When Washington sets a fixed price to control costs, the result is waiting lists, provider shortages, and rationing. Healthcare becomes political.
El-Sayed’s plan also extends coverage toward people in the country illegally. That turns American taxpayers into the funders of a multi-trillion-dollar magnet for illegal immigration.
This same approach shows up in his enforcement policy. He campaigns on abolishing ICE. Pulling people into the country with expansive federal benefits while dismantling the agency tasked with enforcing immigration law is a direct contradiction of a secure border policy.
El-Sayed can say “safe and secure border” on camera. The rest of the platform does the opposite.
First, he campaigns to abolish ICE. He has said it since 2018, repeats it on the stump, and frames ICE as a “paramilitary force” that “must be torn down” and rebuilt “from scratch.” Ending that agency makes removal slower, rarer, and politically harder.
Second, he pairs that with legalization and benefits. He wants ICE money moved into immigration courts and a “clear pathway to citizenship.” He supports the Dream Act and “full healthcare citizenship for every single person, no exceptions.” He has said illegal workers should get coverage if they pay taxes.
In 2018 he argued Michigan should stop “discriminating” by documentation status and issue driver’s licenses to people here illegally. Benefits plus legalization plus weaker interior enforcement is a magnet.
Third, his older record shows how he sees the border. In a deleted 2021 post he asked “why we allow white supremacists to police our borders.” He treats American enforcement as racist.
Put the pieces together: advertise free cradle-to-grave care, extend that system toward people here illegally, abolish the main interior enforcement agency, and loosen the rules for who can get on the voter rolls. One policy pulls people in. The other keeps them here. The last one tries to put them on the ballot.
El-Sayed opposes the SAVE Act, which would mandate proof of citizenship to register to vote. Instead, he backs federal automatic voter registration. That means the state puts you on the rolls when you turn 18 and updates your registration when you move. You do not fill out a separate voter form. You do not show proof of citizenship. The government does it for you.
Michigan already has election fraud problems, allows same-day registration and lets voters sign an affidavit instead of showing a photo ID. Adding his automatic system on top of that makes it harder to keep ineligible people off the rolls.
When you put the whole agenda together, the pattern is clear: pull people in with free benefits, weaken the agency that removes them, and loosen the rules for who can get onto the voter rolls.
Do not let the American flags fool you. El-Sayed’s policies are a vast expansion of state power, massive tax hikes, taxpayer-funded abortions and sex changes for all, and a border policy that lets people in while making it harder to get them out.
Abdul El-Sayed’s policies are anti-American. They are not Trumpian.