- Democrats Haley Stevens, Mallory McMorrow and Abdul El-Sayed battle in Michigan’s closely watched US Senate primary
- Each offers to bring a relatively fresh perspective to an institution where the average age is currently 64
- At 42, Stevens is the oldest candidate in the race but has already won multiple competitive elections to Congress
The three leading Democrats attempting to succeed 67-year-old US Sen. Gary Peters bring different backgrounds and views to their closely watched primary, but they have at least one thing in common: They’re millennials.
US Rep. Haley Stevens, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow and former Wayne County public health official Abdul El-Sayed all promise to bring a fresh perspective to the upper chamber, where the average age is currently 64.
“For people in our generation…there’s been this negative connotation that we complain too much and things are too hard, when all of the data shows it is that much harder for our generation to afford the things that our parents afforded,” said McMorrow, 39, who frequently references her own struggles getting a job after college graduation in campaign stump speeches.
Added El-Sayed, 41: “It’s about damn time.”
The Democratic race has already been called the “most fascinating and consequential primary” in the country, and with three relatively young candidates in the race, many observers have called it a chance for Michigan Democrats to help define the party moving forward.
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Stevens sees this moment as a critical time to make a difference for future generations, allowing Michigan residents to get a good education, land good jobs with benefits and be able to retire with dignity all while staying in state.
“There are a lot of unique challenges that we face, but also incredible opportunity,” she told Bridge.
Political pundits have largely cast Stevens as the moderate establishment favorite, El-Sayed as the progressive darling and McMorrow as something in between — though the candidates themselves see more nuance beyond those ready-made lanes.
Regardless, “this primary will tell us a lot about the direction of the national Democratic Party,” said Jessica Taylor, US Senate and Governors editor for the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, which ranks the seat as one of four true toss-up Senate races in the country. “Who emerges from there could impact how competitive this race is.”
Peters, Michigan’s senior US senator, shocked many Democrats last year when he announced he would not seek a third term this year, opening up a seat in one of the nation’s most politically competitive states.
Now, Democrats competing for the general election will likely take on Republican Mike Rogers, 62, a former member of Congress who has worked to consolidate GOP primary support after coming up just short in his bid for another open US Senate seat two years ago.
Other declared candidates, including Republicans Genevieve Peters Scott and Bernadette Smith and Democrat Rachel Howard, have not attracted the same level of attention.
With Rogers facing little primary opposition thus far, Republicans see a clear lane to the general election that isn’t marred by what they predict could become a messy primary on the Democratic side.
“You’ve got three people who are all wanting the job, and they’re not polling that far apart — that’s usually the recipe for a massive bloodbath,” Michigan Republican Party Chair Jim Runestad told Bridge Michigan. “It’s going to be competitive to the end. Which, of course, we like.”
But Michigan Democratic Party Chair Curtis Hertel sees the primary in a more optimistic light, saying the party has “three great candidates” who have the chance to test their mettle before taking on Rogers.
“It’s a challenge, but it’s also an opportunity, and I think it’s one we’re going to do very well in,” he said.
Stevens pens a ‘love letter’
Now serving her fourth term in Congress, Stevens is no stranger to high-stakes races. The Birmingham Democrat flipped what was then the 11th House district during 2018’s “blue wave” and held it two years later.
When she was drawn into the same district as fellow Democratic incumbent Andy Levin in 2022, she won an oft-bitter primary fight, taking nearly 60% of the vote.
In her quest for higher office, Stevens is banking on the notion that she can do it again, both in August and November. She’s making the case that Democrats need her to defeat Rogers, who only narrowly lost to US Sen. Elissa Slotkin in 2024, and is calling her campaign a “love letter to the state of Michigan, the place where I was born.”
“I’m the only Democrat in this race who’s going to beat Mike Rogers in the fall,” she told Bridge, citing recent polling showing her tied with Rogers in a hypothetical matchup. “I’ve got this appeal with independent voters based on my record of standing up for Michigan, getting things done and showcasing my unique understanding of the needs of our state.”
Stevens has invoked her millennial credentials on the campaign trail before — she was the first Michigan millennial to be elected to Congress. This time around, at 42 years old, she’s the oldest candidate in the Democratic primary.
Her main goal now, she said, is to stay “laser focused” on economic issues plaguing so many Michigan residents, from lowering costs of living to boosting the state’s manufacturing industry through lowering supply chain costs and lessening dependence on China.
Stevens has deep connections in the automotive industry and served in the Obama administration as chief of staff to the US Auto Rescue Task Force, a federal initiative aimed at saving General Motors and Chrysler from bankruptcy.
In Congress, Stevens was a reliable vote for President Joe Biden’s policy priorities, including the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, which allocated billions of dollars in federal funding toward the domestic research and manufacturing of semiconductors.
She’s continued to stay close to her manufacturing roots — her campaign says she’s visited nearly 200 manufacturing businesses across Michigan — and has vocally opposed Trump’s tariff hikes on groceries and other goods, federal spending cuts and actions taken by members of his cabinet.
In recent months, Stevens has introduced articles of impeachment against Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for various policy changes and since-departed Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem over her department’s immigration enforcement tactics. Both proposals were doomed to fail in the Republican-led House.
“This moment that we are in, this moment of uncertainty and chaos brought on by Donald Trump’s agenda — it is surmountable,” Stevens said, adding that she is not afraid to call out the administration “when they are working against the interests of Michigan.”
Stevens’ supporters include former Gov. Jim Blanchard, former US Rep. Brenda Lawrence and a slew of other state and local government officials, who see her as the best shot Michigan Democrats have to continue the party’s decades-long dominance in the US Senate.
“Democrats cannot afford to nominate someone who isn’t ready to go head-to-head with Republican Mike Rogers on day one,” former Michigan Democratic Party Chair Lavora Barnes wrote in a recent op-ed for Deadline Detroit. “If we are serious about holding this seat, Haley Stevens is in the best position to do it.”
El-Sayed brings back Medicare for All
El-Sayed, a medical doctor and former Wayne County health official, first burst into Michigan’s political scene in Michigan’s 2018 Democratic gubernatorial primary, which he ultimately lost to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
He’s back for another run at statewide office, this time in the Senate, because he believes the issues he campaigned on then still haven’t been addressed.
“As frustrating as it is to be eight years on and to hear the urgency that people have, because those problems have just gotten worse, I’m grateful that we are in a position to be able to speak to the pain that Michiganders are facing with the real solutions,” he told Bridge.
El-Sayed isn’t shy about touting his progressive credentials, pointing to endorsements from Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, US Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Detroit, and other prominent progressives. But he rejects the notion that his views are extreme in today’s political climate.
“In an era where our premiums are quickly pricing people out, I think being for Medicare for All is…the moderate position,” he told Bridge. “In an era where Trump is weaponizing ICE against the Constitution itself, I think abolishing ICE is a moderate position.”
While he’s running on a similarly progressive platform as 2018, his life has changed: El-Sayed is now a father of two — a self-described “girl dad” — and his growing family has moved from Detroit to Ann Arbor.
El-Sayed sees value in leadership that carries a bit of that “world weariness” and also understands how rapidly technology can change the world, for better or for worse. But he noted his campaign is taking great care to stay relevant to younger people bumping into similar issues as well as new challenges.
“In this race, we made a point to make sure that our politics represents authentically the challenges that younger people are facing,” he said. “I think there’s a way that even younger candidates sometimes look down their nose at younger voters. We’re not going to make that mistake.”
Joel Rutherford, a Macomb County Democrat who co-hosted a meet-and-greet for El-Sayed at Alkabeer Cafe in Sterling Heights last weekend, said he’s backing El-Sayed because he believes it’s time for Michigan to send someone to Washington who won’t take the politically convenient way out when it comes to delivering on the state’s needs.
“Abdul is somebody who, you know what he believes in, you know what he stands for,” he said.
El-Sayed most recently served as executive director of Wayne County’s Department of Health, Human and Veteran Services from 2023 to 2025 before resigning to pursue political office again.
He remained politically active after losing the 2018 primary, hosting a health and politics podcast since 2019 and serving on the Joe Biden–Bernie Sanders “unity task force” on health care in 2020. He’s also the founder of Southpaw Michigan, a political action committee focusing on electing other progressive candidates in Michigan.
El-Sayed said his principles haven’t changed since the first time he ran, and he promises they won’t change in a race against Rogers — or in the US Senate chambers if he’s elected. Drawing from his medical roots, he said his goal is to ease voters’ pain by offering meaningful solutions.
“Perfectly inoffensive is not what people are looking for,” he said. “They want someone who’s going to fight a righteous fight for the things that they need and deserve.”
McMorrow works to pass the ‘beer test’
During a recent stop at Kelly’s Downtown in Lansing, McMorrow stood on a stool to address a gathered crowd, framed by St. Patrick’s Day window murals. She shared stories about her background, her daughter, her motivation to get involved in politics.
Much of McMorrow’s campaigning has taken place in similarly intimate settings — bars or breweries throughout Michigan, an effort to raise her statewide profile in a way that feels authentic to her.
Instead of waiting for opinion polls to ask voters “which candidate they’d prefer to have a beer with,” a question occasionally used as a barometer to test likeability in politics, McMorrow is giving them the opportunity to try it firsthand.
“I knew that I would have the biggest hill to climb in terms of building up name recognition, but that once people got to know me and our track record here in Lansing, they would be all in,” she told Bridge Michigan. “And so far, that’s showing to be the case.”
McMorrow has pointed to her work during the legislature’s two-year Democratic trifecta as proof that she could be effective in higher office, including sweeping gun violence prevention laws, universal breakfast and lunch and reproductive rights expansion.
Brian Hight, an engineer for the city of Lansing who attended the event, said he appreciated her interest in issues like infrastructure and energy independence and her track record of working with Democrats and Republicans alike in the state Legislature.
“She’s proven that she can get things done,” he said. “She does seem to care about both sides of the aisle.”
Like Stevens, McMorrow was first elected to office in 2018, unseating GOP state Sen. Marty Knollenberg in a district he’d handily won four years prior. In 2022, she also faced a fellow Democratic incumbent after being drawn into the same state Senate district, ultimately winning reelection.
The Royal Oak resident and former designer’s national profile — and fundraising prowess — grew in 2022 after her Senate floor speech responding to a Republican colleague who had suggested she and other Democrats supporting LGBTQ rights wanted to “groom and sexualize kindergartners” went viral.
She’s since published a book and went viral again for a 2024 Democratic National Committee speech where she read from an oversize copy of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, held it over her head and slammed it onto the podium.
Her supporters include three sitting US Senators, Senate Majority Leader Winnie Brinks, D-Grand Rapids, and former Flint Mayor Karen Weaver, the latter of whom said she knew she’d back McMorrow after “observing how she connects with the community.”
McMorrow told Bridge she feels her campaign is exactly where she wants it to be, taking pride in the fact that the bulk of her policy proposals stem from what she’s hearing from voters at events, including a recent plan to better protect kids online.
“I think, more than anything else, people just want somebody who comes across as authentic and trustworthy and cares about them and doesn’t come in saying, ‘I have all the answers,’” she said.
Related: Mallory McMorrow on Michigan US Senate run: ‘New leaders’ need to fix ‘mess’
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