Haley Stevens

Michigan state Sen. Mallory McMorrow has, for now, erased any financial edge U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens had over her in the Democratic donnybrook to determine who will be the party's nominee for an open U.S. Senate seat this fall.

In doing so, McMorrow, of Royal Oak, can also continue to press her claim that she is leading the party's pack less than four months before the Aug. 4 primary and an expected showdown with Republican former U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers of White Lake, who is widely expected to win the GOP nomination on the same day.

"This is absolutely huge," McMorrow said in a short video posted on YouTube, noting than more than 120,000 people have given to the campaign. "And the polls, they're backing us up."

An Emerson College/WOOD-TV poll also released early Thursday, April 16, showed McMorrow in a tie in the Democratic primary race with former Wayne County and Detroit health director Abdul El-Sayed, with each having the support of 24% of those surveyed. Stevens was supported by 13% while a plurality of those surveyed, 39%, were either undecided or preferred someone else. The poll of 519 likely Democratic primary voters, conducted April 11-13, had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.3 percentage points.

An earlier poll by Emerson in January had shown McMorrow ahead in the primary with 22% of the support to 17% for Stevens and 16% for El-Sayed. McMorrow has been near or at the lead in all of the polls for the Democratic primary, including those internal polls released by Stevens' own campaign.

Until now, Stevens, of Birmingham, had laid a tenuous stake to being the favored candidate, based on the support of many mainstream Democrats, a congressional record and a financial edge that saw her with $3.1 million in her campaign coffers at the end of 2025, compared to about $2 million each for McMorrow and El-Sayed.

But in the first three months of 2026, according to reports filed Wednesday, April 15, with the Federal Election Commission, McMorrow raised a total of more than $3 million, almost all of it from individual contributors, compared to $2 million for Stevens and $2.3 million for El-Sayed.

As of March 31, McMorrow was sitting on more than $3.6 million in her campaign coffers, compared to a little less than $3.4 million for Stevens and $2.5 million for El-Sayed. And while there has been a dearth of polling in the Democratic primary to replace Democratic U.S. Sen. Gary Peters, who is stepping down after two six-year terms, there have long been indications that McMorrow was gaining momentum, though it has been far from clear how large an edge, if any, she may have. The April 16 Emerson College/WOOD-TV poll, however, suggests the primary may be becoming a two-person race if it's accurate.

Stevens' campaign downplayed the quarterly results, with her campaign spokeswoman, Joetta Appiah, saying, it remains a competitive primary, "but the fundamentals of this race haven’t changed. We need to keep Mike Rogers out of the Senate, and poll after poll shows Haley Stevens leading the field and best positioned to defeat Mike Rogers in November." Appiah also argued that Stevens has a "unique ability to win over independent voters and strong support among Black voters" who could be decisive.

That said, there's no questioning that McMorrow has been on the upswing.

Before this race, she was best known as having flipped a previously Republican-held district in Oakland County in 2018 before becoming a cable news phenomenon nationally after delivering a fiery five-minute-long rebuke to a Republican colleague in Lansing who has said McMorrow and other Democrats sought to "groom" children. In that response, McMorrow leaned into her status as a mom herself, saying, "I am the biggest threat to your hollow, hateful scheme. Because you can't claim that you are targeting marginalized kids in the name of 'parental rights' if another parent is standing up to say no."

A year ago, she became the first big name candidate to enter the race to replace Peters, though most political observers expected Stevens to enter the race and take frontrunner status, given her own electoral success as well as her stint as the de facto chief of staff to the auto task force that rescued General Motors and what was then Chrysler under former President Barack Obama.

Stevens, for her legislative record and mainstream support, also faces potential headwinds in her own party; she has been described as being recruited by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, though he has been criticized by some of not taking the fight to Republicans in the majority consistently enough. Stevens has also been supportive of Israel's right to defend itself and received support from pro-Israel groups at a time when many younger Democrats and progressives have widely denounced Israel's war in Gaza and American support.

As for El-Sayed, of Ann Arbor, he clearly has a hold on the more progressive lane in the primary and continues to be a factor in terms of fundraising and what few neutral, independent polls have been done for the Democratic primary, despite taking some criticism for holding rallies with Internet personality Hasan Piker, who himself has been described as antisemitic (a claim Piker denies), and for reportedly holding back on a statement regarding a strike that killed Iran's supreme leader, at least in part because some in Michigan's large Arab-American and Muslim communities were "sad."

As for McMorrow, she has been meeting voters at Michigan breweries, calling for debates and striking a middle ground between the other two. In terms of Israel, she got the endorsement of J-Street, a pro-Israel group that nonetheless has advocated for a two-state solution in the Middle East and criticized Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's policies involving the Palestinians.

The Real Clear Politics average of polls has it as a tie between McMorrow and Stevens, with El-Sayed within striking distance.

As for Rogers, who lost a close race to now-Sen. Elissa Slotkin two years ago and enjoys the endorsement of President Donald Trump, he is now sitting on more cash in his campaign bank account than any of the Democrats, $4.2 million as of March 31, and has no major obstacles in the primary. (He raised $2.2 million during the first quarter.) Rogers also has funding pouring in via a joint fundraising effort called Team Rogers in which he shares proceeds with the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the Great Lakes Conservative Fund, a Super PAC that is working to get Rogers elected.

In recent weeks, Rogers also has gotten news that the Senate Leadership Fund is committing $45 million toward getting him elected. Another outside group, Sentinel Action Fund, announced a $15 million effort on Rogers' behalf.

Michigan hasn't elected a Republican to the U.S. Senate since 1994, when Spencer Abraham won a single six-year term. But if Rogers can win, it will be almost impossible for the Democrats to win enough seats nationally to take back control of the chamber.

“The future of our state and country are riding on this race, and we are fighting every day to earn working families’ support. This is a change election,” said Rogers' spokeswoman Alyssa Brouillet. “While Mike’s opponents bow to their far left base, Mike Rogers is focused on fixing everything Democrats have broken over the years of their single-party reign."