Ayanna Pressley

A critical U.S. Senate primary in Michigan on Tuesday is about more than filling an open seat. It’s a test of where the Democratic Party is heading in a key midterm campaign year.

And when U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley looks at the race, she sees a reflection of her own Boston-based district and the impact that Black and brown voters can have in the contest.

Pressley, D-7th District, was in Michigan over the weekend, campaigning for Abdul El-Sayed, the progressive standard-bearer, who has made the race a litmus test on the party’s priorities.

El-Sayed backs Medicare for all and has been sharply critical of the influence of money in politics. Both are issues that have mobilized Democratic voters — particularly younger voters who have flocked to the progressive banner.

El-Sayed faces U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens, a moderate Democrat who has a history of flipping red districts, according to The Washington Post.

The winner faces former U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers, who narrowly lost a Senate bid two years ago, the newspaper reported.

In appearances on the stump and on TV over the weekend, Pressley argued that she believes the two states’ “destinies are tied” together.

“I represent a district that’s deeply unequal, that has been plagued by disparate outcomes across every issue, including, and especially, health outcomes,” Pressley told the Rev. Al Sharpton during an appearance on his MSNow program on Sunday night.

“And I’m especially inspired by the work that Abdul El-Sayed did with rebuilding Detroit’s public health department and the work that he did in that space,” she continued.

The Michigan seat, which opened with the retirement of long-serving Democratic U.S. Sen. Gary Peters, is one of several that could determine which party controls the Senate in 2027.

Maine’s closely watched U.S. Senate contest is another similarly pivotal race.

Pressley, a Chicago native, made nearly identical remarks during a campaign stop in Grand Rapids, Michigan over the weekend, highlighting the common ties — and unequal outcomes —between her district and the Midwest of her youth.

Among them is the 30-year drop in life expectancy that traces the 3-mile bus route between affluent Cambridge, home to Harvard and MIT, and Roxbury, the historic heart of Boston’s Black community.

“Chicago’s the city that raised me. Boston’s the city that changed me,” she said. “But the point is, those disparate outcomes, those inequities, those disparities are not naturally occurring. They’re manmade. They are the consequence of policy choices.”

Pressley and other members of “The Squad,” including U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., are backing El-Sayed in Tuesday’s intra-party contest.

Furthering the New England connection, Massachusetts Democratic U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, joined by U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., are backing El-Sayed as well.

Warren, in a social media video, pointed to El-Sayed’s economic agenda and criticized Stevens, who has benefited from outside spending in the race, including nearly $30 million from a group aligned with AIPAC, Politico reported.

“Michiganders deserve a senator who will fight for you, not for special interests running millions of dollars in TV ads to buy this seat,” Warren said. “And make no mistake: Abdul is the only candidate in this race who can build the grassroots movement needed to win in November.”

El-Sayed has faced criticism that he’s sexist and has made disparaging remarks about women, with ads that highlight his critiques of former First Lady Michelle Obama and Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, according to The Post.

Meanwhile, Bay State U.S. Reps. Jake Auchincloss, D-4th District, and Lori Trahan, D-3rd District, have endorsed Stevens in the race.

An Emerson College poll released last week showed El-Sayed with a 54%-39% lead over Stevens, with 6% undecided. El-Sayed also held an advantage among those undecided voters, according to the poll.

“There is a clear age divide in the Democratic Primary: voters under 50 break for El-Sayed by 42 percentage points, 67% to 25%, and that gap tightens among voters in their 50s to a 12-point lead, and voters over 60 flip to Stevens by a 14-point margin, 53% to 39%,” Emerson pollster Spencer Kimball said in a statement.

Speaking to Sharpton on Sunday, Pressley said that as she traveled Michigan, from Detroit to Grand Rapids, she had been “so inspired by the number of young people that I’ve come across.”

“Many of them, this is the first time that they have worked on a campaign, but they are inspired by this message to get money out of politics and into their pockets and to pass Medicare For All and to stop sending American tax dollars to foreign governments to bomb babies.”

A similar dynamic is playing out in Massachusetts’ Democratic U.S. Senate primary, where Markey, an avowed progressive, faces a challenge from U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, D-6th District.

Moulton, a Marine veteran, is viewed as more moderate than Markey, who has the backing of both Warren and Pressley in the intra-party contest.

Polling in the race has shown Markey leading, though Moulton has closed the distance as the campaign moved into the summer months.

Moulton has made the contest a generational one, arguing that Markey, 80, has served honorably, but that his time has passed. The two men meet for a broadcast debate in Boston on Monday, where it’s guaranteed those themes will be repeated.

In Michigan, both El-Sayed and Stevens have competed for Black voters, who could be determinative in Tuesday’s contest.

An early July poll by the Detroit News showed Stevens with an advantage among Black and older voters. El-Sayed took the support of younger and college-educated voters, irrespective of race, according to The Washington Post.

Speaking to Sharpton on Sunday, Pressley punched up El-Sayed’s ”deep ties" to Michigan’s Black community.

“Whether we’re talking about Pastor Horace Sheffield (a veteran civil rights leader) or his endorsement from the Council of Baptist Pastors for Detroit and Vicinity, this is a big coalition," Pressley said, adding that El-Sayed has “attended more than 100 church services.”

In a May column, Ronald Mitchell, the editor and publisher of The Bay State Banner, urged Black voters in Massachusetts to pay close attention to the race between Markey and Moulton, highlighting the work both candidates have done to win support.

While a win by either Stevens or El-Sayed would mean an increased Democratic edge in the Senate, Pressley made her preferences clear in conversation with Sharpton.

“I’m so tired of just passing bills out of the House to go to the Senate to die a certain death,” she said. “So, I mean, I need someone that’s going to be a truthteller, that’s going to be a fighter, that’s going to be disruptive.”