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Who Do You Serve
Declaring, "I believe in America, I believe in us," an active duty Air Force major was arrested Wednesday for a non-violent act of civil disobedience after he publicly called for Trump to be impeached, removed and convicted for his scores of impeachable offenses. Citing the "foundational oath" he took to defend the country "against all enemies foreign and domestic" - most vitally a lawless president - Major Jason Watson insisted, finally, "The bill must come due."
Watson's action came after a press conference with advocacy groups including About Face Veterans, Defenders of Our Republic, Removal Coalition, its newly launched Remove the Regime, and Free Speech For People, which has gathered over a million signatures urging Congress to initiate impeachment proceedings against Trump for his hundreds of crimes. Also present was Rep. Al Green, the only member of Congress to have filed impeachment articles. Declaring this "an existential moment for our nation," Free Speech president John Bonifaz praised Major Watson for "the kind of courage our democracy demands (in) stark contrast to those who continue to look away as President Trump commits unprecedented abuses of power."
Watson introduced himself by citing his 17-year career in the military before swiftly adding, "Who I am is immaterial. In the grand scheme of things I'm a nobody. What's more important is what I have to say, and the price I'm willing to pay to say it" - which is substantial. Thanking allies "working to restore responsible governance to our country," he repeated the "foundational" oath he first swore over 20 years ago, and has since repeated "many times since," to "support and defend the Constitution of the United States," which "binds us all together as Americans." We have all "played a part in getting us into this mess," he added, but undeniably "the burden of culpability" falls most heavily on the executive branch, "and the bill must come due."
Matter-of-factly, he offered a hefty list of high crimes and misdemeanors: The "unconstitutional usurpation of Congress’ authority" with military action against foreign countries, absent the requisite emergency scenario, in Venezuela, Cuba, Iran; the granting of power to an unelected person to shut down large swaths of the government; the detaining and sending of residents without due process to a foreign country; the abuse and murder of those exercising their First Amendment rights, etc etc. After each, he added, "For this, the president and vice-president must be impeached convicted, and removed." He was there not as a Democrat - "I am not a Democrat" - but to call on Americans to peacefully "join me in the defense of our republic."
Video of his speech then briefly cuts out; when it returns, he is walking slowly, deliberately, toward the Capitol steps, an area that is open to the public but where protest is prohibited. Several Capitol Police stand to the side, nervously watching. In somber, lonesome silence, he climbs the stairs; mid-way, he stops and holds up a sign that reads, "Impeach. Convict. Remove." The watching crowd cheers. After a brief huddle, a couple of officers arrest him. As he is led away, his hands cuffed behind him, his dignity intact, the crowd breaks into chants of "Shame!" and, "Who do you serve? Who do you protect?" Excellent questions. We, and many weary, grieving, enraged Americans, salute him and his good trouble.
Jul 02, 2026
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As Deadly Heatwave Scorches Europe, Fossil Fuel Giants 'Have Blood on Their Hands'
Germany, Switzerland, France, Spain, Belgium, and other European countries were under red-alert warnings on Tuesday as an alarmingly early heatwave continued to scorch the continent, underscoring the threat posed by the fossil fuel-driven climate crisis.
Météo-France, the country's official meteorological administration, said Tuesday that "further record-breaking temperatures are expected, including some that could surpass all previous records, regardless of the time of year," as "sunshine continues to dominate across France, maintaining oppressive and exhausting heat throughout the country." In recent days, France has recorded dozens of deaths linked to the extreme temperatures, including two were children who died in a hot car and 40 people who drowned seeking relief from the heat.
“Heat is hurting children across Europe," Matilde Angeltveit, senior adviser and global climate advocacy lead at Save the Children, said Tuesday. "It affects their health and it is disrupting their education and the impact can sometimes be long term. This should be a joyous time as many children across Europe wrap up the school year, but for many it is not."
Europe's Copernicus Climate Change Service said that while the ongoing heatwave is "remarkable for occurring so early in the year, this event is consistent with Europe’s rapid warming and with the increasing frequency and intensity of heatwaves already observed in summer."
"Europe is the fastest-warming continent, with temperatures rising by approximately 0.56°C per decade since the mid-1990s, more than double the global average," Copernicus noted.
Reuters observed Tuesday that Europe "was the continent furthest above its historic temperature norm on Monday."
"Heatwaves are no longer freak weather anomalies. They are now a recurring crisis inflicting suffering, claiming lives and fracturing our health systems and infrastructure," said Hans Kluge, European regional director for the World Health Organization, which estimates that extreme heat has killed more than 200,000 people across Europe over the past four years.
Campaigners said the current heatwave marks the latest evidence of governments' failure to rein in the fossil fuel industry, which has raked in massive profits this year thanks to the US-Israeli war on Iran.
"This isn’t a natural disaster," said Aaron Regunberg, director of the Climate Accountability Project at the US-based advocacy group Public Citizen, which declared in response to the European heatwave that oil giants "have blood on their hands."
"The fossil fuel industry’s pollution and decades of deception about the impact of burning fossil fuels has spurred this extreme heat, which has already killed multiple people," said Regunberg. "Decades ago, scientists at Exxon were discussing with other oil companies research connecting climate change with ‘suffering and death due to thermal extremes.’ These companies knew of evidence that their conduct would cause these harms, and orchestrated campaigns of climate denial to undermine that evidence. They should be held accountable.”
Areeba Hamid, the co-executive director of Greenpeace UK, said political leaders "need to stop winging it on extreme weather and start treating it as the security and public health challenge it is."
"When classrooms become ovens, care homes overheat, transport starts to buckle and workers are forced to toil in dangerous temperatures, it’s clear the country isn’t ready," said Hamid. "Adaptation alone won’t be enough. Ministers must also stop fossil fuel giants from turning up the heat on our planet—and make them pay for the damage they are causing."
Jun 23, 2026
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Fearing Mass Job Loss, Working-Class US Voters Believe Government Must Act to Prevent Economic Disaster
A poll commissioned by Working Families Power reveals deep anxiety among US workers about the impacts of artificial intelligence, as well as support for the government intervening to prevent potential mass unemployment.
The survey of just over 2,500 working-class American voters, conducted by Justice Research Group, finds that 73% said they were worried that AI would lead to job losses in the US, while 62% said they were concerned that AI would personally affect them or people close to them.
Workers expect that AI will negatively impact a broad number of industries, with majorities saying it will hurt truckers and delivery drivers; retail and service workers; writers, designers, and other creative workers; and office and administrative workers, according to the poll. Pluralities, meanwhile, expect AI to hurt teachers, education workers, and healthcare support workers.
With so many workers fearing massive jobs losses due to AI, they also support major government interventions to alleviate the harms caused by the technology.
Overall, 84% of those surveyed support free training or education for all workers displaced by AI, while 79% support rules to force companies to share AI productivity gains with their workers in the former of higher pay, stronger benefits, and shorter hours.
Even the least popular policy idea presented in the poll—taxing large companies that replace workers with AI and using the money to create a worker unemployment fund—received 69% support among US workers.
The poll's findings could bolster the case made by many progressive politicians about the need to vigorously regulate the AI industry to prevent it from hurting working-class Americans.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) earlier this year introduced a bill that would impose a nationwide moratorium on AI data center construction “until strong national safeguards are in place to protect workers, consumers, and communities, defend privacy and civil rights, and ensure these technologies do not harm our environment."
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) last month proposed a tax on the use of AI to pay for jobs programs for affected workers.
Jun 23, 2026
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Trump Loaded Up on Abbott Laboratories Stock Before His DOJ Dropped Criminal Probe
US President Donald Trump last year purchased hundreds of thousands of dollars of Abbott Laboratories stock before his Justice Department dropped a years-long criminal investigation into the company, which was accused of misconduct after infant hospitalizations and deaths were linked to one of its baby formula factories.
The stock purchases were revealed in the president's annual financial disclosure report, which spans 927 pages and shows thousands of trades valued at over $1 billion. Trump's first purchase of Abbott stock last year was made in late September, and the president bought around $500,000 worth of shares in total in 2025, according to the nonprofit media organization More Perfect Union.
The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday that "top decision makers" at the Department of Justice shut down the criminal investigation into Abbott—which donated $500,000 to Trump's inaugural fund—even though "some prosecutors believed they had evidence to criminally charge the company under a law they have used to pursue other businesses for allegedly selling contaminated foods."
"Prosecutors had been considering a misdemeanor charge against Abbott for violating the federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and a separate count for misleading the government," the Journal reported, citing unnamed people familiar with the matter. "Investigators in early 2022 had found traces of a potentially deadly bacteria at its plant in Sturgis, Michigan, including on equipment very close to infant formula containers—as well as a long list of other problems."
The Food and Drug Administration received reports of at least nine infant deaths linked to baby formula produced at Abbott's Sturgis plant, which the company temporarily shut down amid fears of dangerous contamination. The Justice Department launched its investigation into Abbott, the largest infant formula manufacturer in the US, in 2023, under the administration of former President Joe Biden.
Trump's DOJ has taken a far more lax approach to corporate enforcement, reaching sweetheart settlement deals with companies accused of price-fixing, stifling competition, and other illegal activities.
The Journal reported that the Justice Department and Abbott "reached a settlement to resolve" a separate but related civil lawsuit alleging that the company knowingly "failed to follow manufacturing standards to protect against the risk of contamination."
"That suit, which was joined by 31 states, alleged that Abbott had a 'culture of concealment' at Sturgis and 'withheld information from FDA related to the presence of microorganisms in the Sturgis facility,'" the Journal observed.
SHOCKING: Trump's latest financial disclosures reveal that he invested upwards of $500,000 in Abbott two months before his DOJ dropped the case. https://t.co/qHXF6wvUct
— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) July 1, 2026
Last April, the investigative outlet ProPublica reported that workers at Abbott's Sturgis plant—which resumed production in June 2022—said the company was still "engaging in unsanitary practices similar to those that led it to temporarily shut down."
"Current and former employees told ProPublica that they have seen the plant in Sturgis, Michigan take shortcuts when cleaning manufacturing equipment and testing for microbes," the outlet reported. "The employees said leaks in the factory are sometimes not fixed, a dangerous problem that can promote bacterial growth. They also said workers at the facility do not always take required swabs to check for pathogens while performing maintenance during production. Supervisors have urged workers to increase production and have retaliated against workers who complained about problems, the employees said.
Abbott, whose stock is down significantly year-to-date but up over the past month, called the ProPublica story "misleading" and impugned the motives of workers who spoke to the outlet.
Trump's purchase of Abbott stock wasn't the only buy that preceded significant action by his administration.
"On April 8, 2025, the day before Trump announced the tariff pause, the disclosure shows 327 individual stock purchases worth as much as $12.8 million, one of the largest single-day stock buying sprees disclosed in the filing," Sludge reported on Wednesday. "The purchases included Apple, Microsoft, Nvidia, Amazon, and Alphabet, each valued as much as $250,000, along with scores of other companies. The S&P 500 jumped nearly 10% the following day when Trump announced the pause, one of the largest single-day gains in the index's history."
Jul 02, 2026
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Smotrich Condemned for Plan to 'Illegally Seize' Gaza After Calling for Israel to ‘Complete the Conquest’ and Build Settlements
Israel's far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, called on Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to "complete the conquest" of Gaza on Monday and send Israeli settlers to colonize the territory.
"We are prepared to establish three settlements in the northern perimeter immediately, the moment we receive the green light from the prime minister and the minister of defense," Smotrich said in a video filmed from the city of Sderot, which sits less than a mile from the wall separating the Gaza Strip from Israel.
Smotrich claimed that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) currently "[hold] nearly 70% of the Gaza Strip."
“We must complete the conquest of the remaining 30%,” he said, adding that they need to “defeat Hamas and above all we need to establish a belt of Jewish settlements within the territory of the Strip as a protective border for Sderot and all the communities of the Gaza envelope.”
Smotrich, who has overseen the rapid, violent acceleration of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank—considered illegal under international law—has been quite blatant about his desire to expand settlements into Gaza as well, reversing Israel’s withdrawal of settlers from the territory in 2005.
At a settlements conference last year, he said that “Gaza will be totally destroyed" and that its residents would be "concentrated" in a narrow southern strip while the rest of the territory "will be empty." He celebrated that Gazans would become “totally despairing” and seek “relocation” elsewhere, allowing Jewish Israelis to move in.
As the movement of settlers into the West Bank has ramped up, along with the destruction of Palestinian homes, Smotrich has said that the use of settlements to carve up the West Bank was "killing the idea of the Palestinian state."
Netanyahu has never said explicitly that he wants to resettle Gaza, but he did say last month, during a speech at an illegal West Bank settlement, that he'd ordered the military to seize 70% of Gaza in violation of the boundaries drawn up under last year's ceasefire agreement, which put Israel in temporary control of about 53% of the territory.
The peace plan laid out by US President Donald Trump, backed by a United Nations Security Council resolution, which underpins the ceasefire signed in October, states explicitly that "Israel will not occupy or annex Gaza."
The Resistance Committees in Palestine, a collection of armed groups in Gaza working closely with Hamas, described Smotrich's call to build settlements in the strip a "dangerous criminal escalation" and a "fully-fledged war crime" in a statement on Tuesday.
They described it as "a scheme to settle the conflict and impose a fait accompli in the context of the genocidal war" and a "dangerous development aimed at sabotaging the efforts of mediators and guarantors to solidify the ceasefire agreement and liquidate the Palestinian cause and presence in Gaza."
Assal Rad, a fellow at the Arab Center in Washington DC, emphasized that Smotrich was hardly a fringe figure.
"This isn’t a random person," she said. "He’s a high-ranking Israeli official declaring the intent to illegally seize Gaza."
Jun 30, 2026
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Congress Urged to Reject Trump's $88 Billion Request for Iran War That ‘Everyone Hates’
The Trump administration is facing pushback after it formally asked the US Congress to approve $88 billion in supplemental funding that will primarily be used to pay for President Donald Trump's illegal war of choice with Iran.
In a letter sent to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russell Vought said that most of the requested funding "will address urgent needs related to Operation Epic Fury (OEF), in addition to other critical needs such as responding to the Ebola outbreak in Central Africa and supporting hardworking American farmers."
Many congressional Democrats, however, were not eager to go along with the administration's $88 billion request.
"Trump and [Defense Secretary Pete] Hegseth are now asking for $88 BILLION more for their illegal war in Iran," wrote Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) in a Thursday social media post. "Just as I predicted, they are pairing this money with other priorities to buy votes for this war. The American people shouldn't backfill this blunder. Not another dime!"
Van Hollen was joined in his opposition to further war funding by his colleague Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), Senate Democrats' top appropriator, who said she would not "rubber-(stamp tens of billions more for this disastrous war of choice."
Murray also highlighted the opportunity cost of the president's war.
"This president is telling the American people there’s no money for healthcare, housing, or childcare," the Washington Democrat said, "but there should be endless taxpayer dollars to fund wars they don’t support."
Rep. Brendan Boyle (D-Pa.), the top Democrat on the House Budget Committee, similarly noted that "the tens of billions in military spending requested by the Trump administration could be used to protect Americans’ healthcare, feed hungry children, and help working families afford everyday life."
Elected officials aren't the only ones signaling opposition to the Trump administration's request.
Steve Ellis, president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, noted that Trump is asking Congress for more money even though he completely bypassed the legislature when launching the war in late February.
"About six weeks ago, the Pentagon put the cost of the Iran War at $29 billion," Ellis said. "Now they want more than twice that? Either the administration wasn’t being honest about the costs then, or they aren’t being honest about the costs now."
Ellis also pointed out that the US Department of Defense is still sitting on roughly $100 billion in unobligated funds it could tap to replenish the munitions used in the illegal war.
"The need to address certain munitions shortfalls resulting from the war is real, but the Pentagon already has plenty of funds to do so," he explained, "and any future investments beyond that should happen through the regular budget process, not through a partisan reconciliation bill or a slapdash supplemental."
Robert Weissman, co-president of Public Citizen, said it appeared Trump was making this supplemental funding request because he knew Congress would not approve the unprecedented $1.5 trillion defense budget he proposed.
"Hegseth and Trump are circling back to their first deeply unpopular option for increasing the Pentagon budget—a supplemental funding bill for an illegal war on Iran that nobody asked for and everyone hates," said Weissman. "This effort, like the others, will fail."
Weissman warned members of Congress against supporting any additional funding requested by the administration, which he said Trump and Hegseth would likely take as approval for "launching more illegal and unconstitutional wars and military actions."
"And no so-called sweetener should make any difference whatsoever," he emphasized. "This is a bitter Pentagon potion that no one should swallow."
Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at the Center for International Policy, urged Democrats to uniformly reject Trump's request.
"No Democratic lawmaker should bow to Trump’s demand that working Americans pay even more for his disastrous war on Iran," Williams said. "Funds to replenish stockpiles can come from elsewhere in the already bloated, record-high Pentagon budget—or tax the oil and arms investors who made a killing."
Jun 25, 2026
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Who Is Funding the Democrats Who Say 'We're Capitalists, Not Socialists'? Probably These Billionaire Capitalists
An investigation found that the anti-socialist group Promise to America has ties to a PAC funded by billionaires such as LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman.
Jul 02, 2026
More than a dozen corporate Democrats last week responded to upstart progressive wins in primaries by pledging their support to a political manifesto called "Promise to America," which emphasizes support for capitalism, law enforcement, and "fiscal discipline."
A Thursday report published by Sludge about the Promise to America found that it "is closely tied to the Welcome Party, a group whose PAC has received more than half of its individual contributions from billionaires."
According to Sludge, the Promise to America appeared in public for the first time last month at Welcome Party's annual WelcomeFest conference, where it was signed by Reps. Tom Suozzi (D-NY) and Adam Gray (D-Calif.).
Other prominent Democrats who have signed the pledge include Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ), Vincente Gonzalez (D-Texas), and Don Davis (D-NC).
Although Sludge uncovered no evidence that Welcome Party is financially supporting the Promise to America, the manifesto's presence at the group's conference was notable given that billionaire donations account for more than 60% of the $10.8 million in donations that it has received over the last five years.
Major donors to the PAC include LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman, who has donated a total of $1.8 million, and former 21st Century Fox CEO James Murdoch, who with his wife Kathryn has donated $2.5 million.
Other notable billionaires who have contributed to WelcomePAC include Bain Capital co-founder Joshua Bekenstein, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and several members of the Walton family.
Sludge's investigation also found that "more billionaires may have donated to the Welcome Party’s two 'dark money' nonprofit arms, which do not disclose their donors publicly."
The Promise to America manifesto has drawn heavy criticism from progressives.
In a recent interview with political commentator Santita Jackson, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) said that the corporate Democrats' pledge was a reactive document that lacked policy solutions to the problems facing Americans.
"Okay fine, if you’re against [democratic socialists], that’s okay. But what do you believe?" said Ocasio-Cortez. "And that I think is the core of the weaknesses from that wing at this moment. There’s no affirmative vision really coming from most places in the Democratic Party with the exception of democratic socialism."
Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) last week also challenged the corporate wing of the party in a speech on the floor of the US House of Representatives in which he defended the vision being laid out by progressive insurgents.
“The progressive movement is winning across the country, from the heart of New York to Michigan to Maine,” Khanna said. “The people are saying no to foreign wars and they’re saying no to genocide in Gaza. They’re saying no to the unfair and lopsided economy that has allowed a few people to hoard extreme wealth and power, and they’re saying yes to Medicare for All.”
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Colorado Governor Fires Officials Who Criticized Democrat's Release of Election-Denying Clerk
"Firing people who oppose you is also a page out of Trump's playbook," said US Rep. Pramila Jayapal.
Jul 02, 2026
US Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal on Thursday accused Democratic Colorado Gov. Jared Polis of conduct commonly seen from President Donald Trump's after Polis fired two members of the state clemency board, citing their decision to speak out publicly against his release of former county Clerk Tina Peters.
In 2024, Peters was sentenced to nine years in prison for tampering with voting equipment in an effort to prove the false claim that the 2020 election was rigged against Trump. The president, who faced his own legal challenges for spreading the falsehood and trying to overturn the election, issued a symbolic pardon for Peters and pressured Polis to commute her sentence, which Polis did in May, angering members of his own party and democracy advocates.
Two members of the state clemency board, Hannah Seigel Proff and Azra Taslimi, were among those who opposed Polis' decision, and they went against the board's usual custom of maintaining secrecy about its proceedings to reveal that the entire board had twice voted unanimously to reject Peters' bid for a shorter sentence, only to be overruled by the governor.
On Wednesday, Proff and Taslimi told The New York Times that they'd received dismissal letters from Polis, who told them they had "breached the required duty of confidentiality by publicly divulging board members’ votes."
Jayapal (D-Wash.) said Polis' commutation of Peters's sentence was akin to acting like the January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol by election-denying Trump supporters "didn't happen."
"Firing people who oppose you is also a page out of Trump's playbook," said the congresswomen.
The board members also revealed that Polis had passed over other deserving applications for parole before he allowed Peters to walk free on June 1.
"We have reviewed hundreds of applications that moved us to tears," they wrote in an op-ed at The Denver Post. "People who spent decades atoning for a single terrible decision, who attended college or seminary behind bars, completed countless programs, developed curricula for other incarcerated people, mentored young offenders, and raised thousands of dollars for victims’ rights organizations."
"Along with nine other members of the board, we have read applications supported by prosecutors who tried the case, by prison wardens who watched the transformation happen, and even by victims themselves," they continued. "And we have seen the governor fail to act or delay many of these applications."
A spokesperson for Polis told the Times that their decision to divulge the two unanimous votes against Peters' release threatened the "credibility of the board." Taslimi told 9NEWS Denver that Polis' real message in deciding to fire the two board members "is that the public doesn't have the right to know that his own advisory board told him no, twice, unanimously."
"That's not protecting the process, that's protecting himself from scrutiny," said Taslimi.
Gov. Jared Polis passed over other deserving inmates to give clemency to Tina Peters, according to two members of his clemency board who revealed Polis overruled the unanimous recommendation of his experts. Polis has now fired both of them. pic.twitter.com/N2bc8uxSc7
— Kyle Clark (@KyleClark) July 2, 2026
The two dismissed board members noted in their op-ed that Peters, unlike many of the people who have submitted clemency applications that have been rejected by Polis, has "expressed no contrition" for the crime she was convicted of.
"Within hours of her release, Peters appeared on a podcast and immediately resumed her attacks on the integrity of US elections," they wrote. "She repeated the debunked conspiracy theory that voting machines cheated Donald Trump out of reelection in 2020 and portrayed herself as a martyr to the effort to expose it. She called her release a miracle."
"The governor said he was moved by her admission that she made a mistake," they added. "She walked out of prison and told the world she made no mistake at all."
Proff told 9NEWS that she might regret her decision to speak out if her fellow board members were "disappointed" in her public revelations about the panel's operations.
"But I really have a feeling that the person who's upset," said Proff, "is the one that was using our board as backing for a politically unpopular and unjust decision."
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In First 2026 Senate Endorsement, AOC Backs El-Sayed in Crucial Michigan Race
"Together, we’re proving that even in the face of unprecedented outside spending, a movement powered by the people can win," El-Sayed said.
Jul 02, 2026
As the progressive movement builds its momentum in Democratic primaries, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez issued her first endorsement in a competitive Senate primary on Thursday, throwing her support behind Dr. Abdul El-Sayed as he battles for the party's Senate nomination in Michigan.
Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), a likely 2028 presidential candidate and one of the most popular figures among the Democratic base, is perhaps the biggest player yet to back El-Sayed, the former public health director for Detroit, who polls currently show leading the more establishment-friendly Rep. Haley Stevens (D-Mich.) and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-8).
The primary, which will take place on August 4, will determine who faces Republican former Rep. Mike Rogers in a race that could decide whether Democrats flip the Senate in November.
AOC's support for El-Sayed—who has championed Medicare for All, an arms embargo against Israel, raising taxes on the wealthy, and overturning Citizens United—puts her at odds with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who has backed Stevens, and with other progressive Democrats like Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Chris Murphy (D-Ct.) who prefer McMorrow.
However, El-Sayed has his own share of high-profile supporters, including Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), as well as a host of progressive House members, including Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), and Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.).
“Despite our ideological differences and whatever disagreements there are in the party, every single one of us sees this moment as existential,” Ocasio-Cortez told The New York Times. “And I think many people are willing to put aside differences in order to give us the best chance at winning. And I think that Abdul gives us that right now.”
Though he appears to be in the driver’s seat with just over a month before the August 4 Michigan primary, El-Sayed still faces a perilous path to the nomination that AOC’s endorsement may help him to weather.
While El-Sayed has sworn off big money donors, Stevens—the candidate closest behind him—is armed with more than $16 million in super PAC spending, including millions from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee's (AIPAC) political spending arm, the United Democracy Project, which has begun to blanket the airwaves with ads boosting Stevens, who also has the backing of nearly 100 other corporate PACs representing the health insurance industry, Wall Street banks, fossil fuels, and Big Tech, among others.
The alliance between AOC and El-Sayed is nearly a decade in the making. Fresh off the stunning primary upset that led her to Congress in 2018, she endorsed the doctor's then-longshot bid to become governor of Michigan.
Sharing a photo of the two at a campaign event eight years prior, El-Sayed celebrated AOC as someone who "has spent her career taking on the powerful on behalf of everyday people, and she has shown all of us what courageous, smart, values-driven leadership looks like."
He added that she "has changed the trajectory of American politics and inspired a generation to believe that government really can work for working people."
"Together, we’re proving that even in the face of unprecedented outside spending, a movement powered by the people can win," El Sayed said.
Indeed, that movement has been winning of late.
AOC's endorsement of El-Sayed comes after three House candidates backed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani—including multiple self-identified democratic socialists—cruised to victory over establishment Democrats in their primaries last week.
This week showed that the left-wing insurgency was underway nationwide, with 29-year-old democratic socialist Melat Kiros stunning longtime Democratic Rep. Diana DeGette in Colorado's primary.
Pollster Adam Carlson said that El-Sayed's race in Michigan will go a long way towards demonstrating the extent to which AOC and her movement truly have reshaped the political landscape.
“If El-Sayed wins the primary and the general election in the swingiest of swing states, ahead of 2028,” he said, “it would give the progressive wing of the party a proof of concept that the conventional wisdom of 'more moderate equals more electable' has some serious holes in it, at least in the second Trump era.”
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