Michigan Senate hopeful Abdul El-Sayed fires back at CNN choosing to ‘fixate’ on ‘defund the police’ comments

El-Sayed Addresses CNN Over His Stance on Police Funding During Senate Campaign

Confrontation on Defund Comments

Michigan Senate hopeful Abdul El Sayed - Michigan's Senate hopeful Abdul El-Sayed found himself facing questions regarding his historical positions on police department funding during a recent appearance on CNN's Sunday program, "Inside Politics." The network highlighted a previously recorded radio conversation in which the Democratic candidate appeared to endorse reducing police budgets following the widespread demonstrations that erupted after George Floyd's death in 2020.

During that earlier broadcast, El-Sayed articulated his interpretation of what reducing police funding actually meant. He explained that his position centered on redirecting resources away from methods that lead to incarceration and street confrontations, while simultaneously increasing investment in community education and empowerment programs designed to address entrenched poverty and systemic racial inequality.

"I believe that we do need to defund the police insofar as defunding the police is disinvesting in the means of incarcerating or killing them on the streets," El-Sayed stated at the time. "And in investing more in the means of educating and empowering, engaging communities with the means of being able to take on systemic poverty, that we've allowed systematic racism to allow to fester in too many communities."

CNN Host Challenges Candidate's Consistency

CNN's Manu Raju brought up these past remarks during the interview, noting that El-Sayed had previously asserted he never supported efforts to reduce police budgets. The candidate responded by emphasizing how carefully he had defined his position when making those earlier statements.

"You know, what's interesting about that comment is I go as far as defining what I mean by that," El-Sayed explained. "Do you disagree with investing in libraries and public services and social services? You fixate on the word 'defund,' but what I'm talking about is war material that we made too much of during the war in Iraq. And then, because we had too much of it, we had to find somewhere to sell it. So we sold it to a whole bunch to local police departments."

The candidate continued by affirming his support for maintaining adequate compensation and retirement benefits for law enforcement officers. He referenced his professional experience working alongside police personnel during his tenure in Wayne County, Michigan.

Electability Concerns and Public Safety Vision

Raju pressed further, suggesting that the defund debate might present challenges for El-Sayed's campaign as voters head to the polls in November. The candidate disagreed, arguing that most Americans simply want to return home safely each evening and that current approaches to public safety often over-rely on armed officers for situations that might be better handled differently.

"Let me finish my answer, Manu," El-Sayed responded. "I actually don't think it is. I think the vast majority of people agree that they want to get home safely every night. I think the way that we have thought about law enforcement is we answer every social problem with somebody with a gun, and you talk to folks in law enforcement with whom I've worked very closely, they'll tell you they don't want to go on those runs where they know that somebody is in mental crisis."

El-Sayed proposed an alternative model where communities would invest in secure retirement packages for officers while also deploying trained mental health specialists rather than armed personnel to certain calls. He maintained that this approach aligned with what most reasonable citizens desire regarding public safety.

"So maybe instead of investing in war material for police, we invest in a safe retirement for them," he continued. "And then, instead of sending a guy with a gun, we actually send a trained mental health professional. That's what I'm talking about, El-Sayed added. That's what I defined. And I think that's exactly what people want."

Previous Positions and Campaign Response

Before launching his Senate bid, El-Sayed removed multiple social media posts that criticized law enforcement agencies. One notable message from June 2020, posted on X shortly after Floyd's death, argued that major American cities allocated excessive resources to policing poverty while underfunding essential services like public education, healthcare, recreation programs, and housing initiatives.

"Most major US cities spend WAY TOO MUCH on police departments to police poverty & WAY TOO LITTLE on public schools, health departments, recreation departments, & housing to eliminate poverty. Fixing that is what the #Defund movement is about," El-Sayed wrote in that post.

When questioned about these tweets earlier in the month, El-Sayed denied participating in any genuine defund campaigns. He characterized his position as supporting proper funding levels while questioning whether the current system structure served communities effectively.

"Judge me by my work, I funded the system because it needed to be funded," he said. "Too often the conversation we have is fund or defund. The question that we don't ask is, what kind of system do we really want? I want us to be investing in the kinds of interventions that actually protect people."

Fox News Digital contacted El-Sayed's campaign team seeking additional commentary but had not received a formal response at the time of publication.