El-Sayed Welcomes Trump's Pledge to End US Military Aid to Israel, Despite Sharp Differences

Democratic Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed of Michigan on Wednesday praised President Donald Trump's announcement a day earlier that the United States will stop providing military aid to Israel at the end of this year, offering rare agreement with a president he otherwise opposes.

"A broken clock is right twice a day. I think the president is actually right on this policy," El-Sayed told NPR in an interview. He added that he would also like Washington to stop selling weapons "that gets used to do the worst things, including genocide and apartheid to Israel," arguing: "We have a responsibility to keep that money here to invest in the things that we need here." Most American aid to Israel is required to be spent on American-produced weapons.

Trump said he had agreed with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to wrap up US aid to Israel by the end of 2026, even though Netanyahu has publicly discussed phasing it out gradually over a ten-year period, and the current aid package is not due to expire until the end of 2028. The president said he was acting at Netanyahu's request, insisting Israel no longer needs the assistance, and argued the move would strip "lunatics" like El-Sayed of the ability to criticize Washington for giving Israel more military aid than any other country.

Fresh off his victory over Republican Mike Rogers, El-Sayed restated his support for "dignifying the idea of equal rights to peace, dignity and self-determination for Palestinian and Jewish Israelis alike." He said the United States has often "tricked ourselves by saying the phrase two-state solution, while we subsidize and aid, arm and abet the very people who are trying to foreclose on the possibility of a Palestinian state."

El-Sayed also voiced support for international investigations of Israel at the United Nations, the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice, all of which the Trump administration has worked aggressively to halt. "I think we should be being objective about the way that we treat Israel, just like we treat any other country," he said.

In multiple interviews, the senator-elect declined to say whether he will back Chuck Schumer to remain the Democratic leader in the Senate. With Democrats winning the chamber in the midterm elections, Schumer is set to become majority leader, a post he last held in 2024.

Speaking to The Associated Press, El-Sayed said he does not yet know who else might run but added, "I do believe we need new leadership and I think people are hungry for it." Asked the same question on NBC, he replied: "We need action, we need leadership toward that action, and I'm interested to see, working with the rest of our caucus, what options we've got."

El-Sayed's position is unlikely to be decisive. Democrats will hold at least 54 Senate seats, and Schumer is expected to keep the leadership job. Schumer, a moderate and longtime pro-Israel stalwart who has nonetheless criticized Netanyahu and called on him to step down in 2024, supported El-Sayed's Senate campaign.

When Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens, who was backed by Schumer but lost the primary to El-Sayed, endorsed El-Sayed's Republican opponent, Schumer issued a statement saying: "This is a despicable betrayal from Rep. Stevens. Senate Democrats are united in our support for Abdul El-Sayed, because we know he will fight for the economic interests of working families in Michigan." El-Sayed, a progressive who routinely accuses Israel of genocide, is set to become one of the country's harshest critics in the Senate.