Haley Stevens

Abdul El-Sayed, the progressive candidate competing for Michigan's Democratic Senate nomination, is soaring past U.S. Representative Haley Stevens ahead of next week's primary election.

A handful of polls conducted over the past couple of weeks show El-Sayed, a former public health official, in a double-digit lead over Stevens, whose moderate platform appears to be falling flat among the state's Democratic base.

In one of the latest surveys, run by Emerson College Polling earlier this week, Stevens trailed by 15 percentage points among likely voters. She only received a majority of ballots from voters 60 and older out of the six age groups tested.

“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%,” said Spencer Kimball, the polling firm's executive director.

El-Sayed's progressive platform—he supports ICE's abolishment and changing the Supreme Court's makeup—appeals to Democrats desperate for change after a year and a half of conservative governance. He's drawn a contrast between himself and Stevens, who has promoted a more pragmatic approach to addressing issues important to the party.

"Corporate donors are perfectly fine with either Haley Stevens or Mike Rogers," El-Sayed said in a Sunday X post, referencing the presumptive Republican nominee. "Why? Because either of them would be a reliable vote on all of their priorities, which is using that Senate seat to monetize us at every turn to get what they want and not what we need."

Stevens has asserted her independence from special interests and cast herself as a more promising candidate against Rogers, the former congressman endorsed by President Donald Trump. The Republican, she says, will fare better against El-Sayed in a state won by Trump two years ago.

"I’m the only Democrat in this race who can beat Trump’s hand-picked candidate in November," Stevens said on Thursday. "That’s because we’ve built a winning coalition that includes Michiganders from every corner of our state."

Voters will decide on Tuesday who to send to the general election, which could determine Democrats' chance of retaking the Senate majority. The party needs to defend all its blue seats, including the one being vacated by Michigan's Gary Peters, and flip four to achieve a majority in the chamber.