DETROIT (Michigan News Source) – A Donald Trump supporter is criticizing a campaign ad recently put out by Democrat Abdul El-Sayed in which he edits snippets of Trump’s past conversation with the co-founder of the Taliban to make it look like Trump is talking directly to El-Sayed.
El-Sayed, who is running for the U.S. Senate in Michigan, criticizes Trump for the current federal government shutdown and rising health care costs in the political ad.
What’s in the ad?
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The heavily edited clip of Trump in the ad comes from a discussion Trump had years ago with Abdul Ghani Baradar, the co-founder of the Taliban. Trump showed Abdul Ghani Baradar a photo of the Taliban leader’s home with an implied threat it would be bombed if Afghanistan aggressions against the U.S. military didn’t stop.
In the campaign ad, El-Sayed pretends that Trump is referring to him and not the Taliban leader.
El-Sayed asks “Donny” why he is shutting down the government.
Then a clip of Trump is spliced in where Trump says, “You are going to have to figure that out, Abdul.”
“Abdul, don’t do it anymore,” Trump says, again referring to the Taliban leader.
El-Sayed then asks why Trump pronounces “Abdul” in the manner he does.
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“Why do you say my name that way,” El-Sayed asks in the video, tongue in cheek. “It makes me feel weird.”
“Geared toward the Muslim population.”
Trump supporter Laura Loomer, a conservative online influencer, made the link between El-Sayed and the leader of the Taliban party in a Oct. 15 post on X.
Loomer claimed that the Michigan politician was catering to the Muslim population: “Michigan has a very large Muslim population, and this ad is geared toward the Muslim population in the way Abdul asks President Trump, ‘why are you saying my name like that.’ The Ad is meant to resonate with Muslim voters, and Abdul is one of the top 5 most popular Muslim names. This is incredibly disturbing, as it proves the Muslims running for office in Michigan are now openly glorifying Islamic terrorism as a way to appeal to the large Muslim voting block in Michigan.”
Loomer called Abdul El-Sayed a “Jihadist” and said he blocked her on X.
El-Sayed: “We choke them out.”
In August at a Democrat rally in Michigan, El-Sayed called Trump’s administration “goons” and gave Democrats advice on how to deal with Republicans and to “choke them out.”
“We don’t back down. With all due respect, if they go low, we don’t go high. We take them to the mud and we choke them out,” El-Sayed said.