The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the anti-Israel group whose leader said he was "happy" about October 7, is quietly funding left-wing Democrat Abdul El-Sayed's Senate bid in Michigan. That financial support comes after El-Sayed made demonization of the pro-Israel American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) a central pillar of his primary campaign against Michigan congresswoman Haley Stevens, maligning the American group's support as foreign meddling in the election.
The Unity & Justice Fund, which CAIR launched in 2024 as part of its effort "to elevate the political influence of the Muslim community" in the aftermath of Oct. 7, 2023, gave $175,000 on July 21 to Fighting for Michigan PAC, which was formed to back El-Sayed's Senate bid, according to campaign finance records released Thursday.
Fighting for Michigan, which calls itself a "coalition of progressive, labor, veterans, and advocacy organizations working to elect" El-Sayed," has emerged as the largest outside group supporting the far-left Democrat, spending nearly $3 million to date on digital ads and polls in support of El-Sayed.
CAIR's sizable financial support for El-Sayed underscores the candidate's foundational dislike of Israel and thinly veiled sympathy for Islamic extremism. He has faced intense scrutiny for campaigning with Hasan Piker, an influencer who said that "America deserved 9/11" and that Hamas is "a thousand times better" than Israel.
Some Jewish leaders have accused El-Sayed of fostering antisemitism over his barrage of attacks on AIPAC, a pro-Israel advocacy group that supported Stevens. "AIPAC has spent a record amount in this race to elect my opponent because she'll be a reliable vote to a foreign government that is aiding, arming, and abetting a genocide," El-Sayed said last month.
The El-Sayed campaign did not respond to a request for comment about whether CAIR's support for his campaign constitutes foreign meddling in the election.
El-Sayed, who has rubbed shoulders with members of the antisemitic Nation of Islam during his campaign, will appear at an Islamic conference over Labor Day weekend with clerics who have called the Holocaust a "hoax." Another cleric who is known for "pedophilic rhetoric" was kicked off a panel following a report in the Washington Free Beacon.
CAIR is the largest Muslim advocacy group in the United States and one of the most controversial. The Department of Justice labeled CAIR an "unindicted coconspirator" of the Holy Land Foundation, a Hamas front group, in a federal terrorism investigation in 2008. Florida governor Ron DeSantis (R.) and Texas governor Greg Abbott (R.) have declared CAIR a "terrorist organization" and banned state agencies from cooperating with the nonprofit.
Nihad Awad, the cofounder and executive director of CAIR, stoked outcry in late 2023 for stating he was "happy to see" Hamas attack Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. The Biden White House condemned Awad's "antisemitic" statements and removed CAIR from its "Combat Antisemitism" working group.
Awad announced the formation of "a lobbying organization" in a podcast interview on "Unlocking Muslim American Power" in 2024, saying that CAIR launched it "to elevate the political influence of the Muslim community, and especially this was created after the genocide in Gaza."
"CAIR has also created a super PAC … and it's called Unity & Justice Fund," said Awad, who added, "If you want to have influence, you have to pay for it."
Basim Elkarra, a CAIR official and executive director of its lobbying arm, CAIR Action, was listed as the fund's initial treasurer. CAIR Action has contributed $185,000 to Unity & Justice Fund, according to campaign records.
Unity & Justice Fund's donation to the pro-El-Sayed group is its largest outlay to date. Last year, the group gave $100,000 to New Yorkers for Lower Costs, an anti-Israel group that backed New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani (D.), the Free Beacon reported.
Fighting for Michigan PAC is backed by several other anti-Israel activists and organizations. El-Sayed's father-in-law, Tayeb Jukaku, has contributed $300,000 to the group. Jukaku, who gave another $100,000 to Unity & Justice Fund on July 20, is a founding member of the Islamic Society of North America, a group that serves as the public face of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States. The Institute for Middle East Understanding, an anti-Israel group that has said Israel is "the root cause of the violence" in the Middle East, has contributed $400,000 to Fighting for Michigan PAC.
Fighting for Michigan, formed by progressive operative Hannah Fertig, has spent millions of dollars on digital ads that largely ignore the Israel-Hamas war that is so near and dear to its donors' hearts. Its recent ads tout El-Sayed's support for "Medicare for All" and "lower costs" and another highlights his role as "football captain" of his high school team.
There are other intriguing revelations in Fighting for Michigan's latest campaign disclosure.
The group gave $19,825 as a "nonprofit contribution" to 5Plus1, a dark money political group affiliated with Horace Sheffield, a Detroit pastor who has endorsed El-Sayed and interviewed him multiple times on his talk radio show. El-Sayed has touted Sheffield's endorsement.
El-Sayed, who is struggling with black voters he must win over to prevail in November, has paid $82,500 to another Sheffield group called the Ecumenical Ministers Alliance for "political consulting," the Free Beacon reported. That arrangement has stoked allegations of political pay-for-play because neither El-Sayed nor Sheffield have disclosed the payments during their interviews.
Fighting for Michigan PAC has paid tens of thousands of dollars for polls of the Democratic primary that proved wildly inaccurate.
It paid $24,000 last month to Tulchin Research, which published a poll that found El-Sayed leading Stevens by 19 points in the Democratic primary.
El-Sayed ended up beating Stevens by just 1 point.
Unity & Justice Fund paid around $40,267 for voter canvassing services to Chase & Porter, a consulting firm owned by Mallak Beydoun, the chief of staff to the mayor of Dearborn Heights, a heavily Muslim suburb of Detroit.
