Michigan US Senate Primary Results by the Numbers
The hotly contested Democratic primary is within a whisker of becoming the most narrowly decided U.S. Senate primary in state history
With more than 98 percent of the expected vote counted, Abdul El-Sayed has defeated U.S. Representative Haley Stevens in Michigan’s open seat U.S. Senate race.
While official results will tell the tale of the tape, as of Wednesday afternoon, El-Sayed (48.49 percent) holds a 0.98-point lead over Stevens (47.51 percent).
If that stands, the 2026 Democratic battle will go down as the second narrowest victory margin in a U.S. Senate primary in Michigan history.
That mark is currently held by the six-candidate 1994 Democratic race that saw six-term U.S. Representative Bob Carr (24.01 percent) edge out State Senator Anna Pollock (23.06 percent) by 0.95 points.
Only one other Michigan Democratic U.S. Senate primary has been decided by less than 15 points. In 1936, two-term U.S. Representative Prentiss Brown was nominated by 2.1 points with 36.3 percent of the vote over Louis Ward of Pontiac, a former business representative of radio priest Charles Coughlin.
Smart Politics previously reported how unusual it is for Michigan Democrats to host competitive races for U.S. Senator with 27 of the 40 nominees prior to El-Sayed winning uncontested.
El-Sayed’s ~48.5 percent will go down as the sixth plurality Democratic primary victory for the office.
In addition to the aforementioned Carr and Brown, the remaining three plurality winners were State Liquor Control Commission Chair Frank Picard in 1934 (42.9 percent), five-term U.S. Representative Donald Riegle in 1976 (44.3 percent) and former Detroit City Councilor Carl Levin in 1978 (38.9 percent).
On the Republican side of the ballot, former seven-term U.S. Representative Mike Rogers was nominated without opposition – the 16th time Michigan Republicans have nominated a candidate for U.S. Senator in such fashion.
Smart Politics recently documented how Rogers (the GOP’s 2024 nominee for the office) is looking to buck history in the state: failed Michigan U.S. Senate candidates have subsequently run for the office 12 additional times during the primary era – losing all 12 bids.
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– The vote margin is (apparently) beyond that for a recount, automatic or otherwise. However, the margin is way closer than indicated by the myriad of polls that had shown the onetime Wayne County health director with 10, even 20-percentage-point margins (indeed, almost as catastrophically bad as the 1936 Literary Digest poll indicating a landslide win for “Alf” Landon).
– State legislator Mallory Ann McMorrow had belatedly withdrawn from the primary election but remained on the ballot, garnering votes that turned out to be approximately *4 times* the MOV of the nominee. However, it would be presumptuous to conclude that Representative Stevens would have been the nominee had the erstwhile aspirant withdrawn ‘before the deadline’.
– As with M J “Mike” Rogers “Abdul” ES has a loss in his electoral record – a double-digit primary loss to departing Governor “Big Gretch” Whitmer in 2018 (the term limit on the office automatically lets the latter avoid having to appear on the same statewide ballot as her onetime opponent, who allegedly had dismissed her gestures of reconciliation afterwards).
– Fair or not, the nomination of Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed arguably augments the odds that former Representative Rogers will be elected to the Senate even as the Democrats will likely win the gubernatorial election. Such a split electoral outcome – the reverse of 2014, 1990, 1978, 1970… – would be the first since 1952, when Democrat Gerhard Mennen Williams won the gubernatorial election and Republican Charles Edward Potter won the senatorial election (by defeating Blair Moody, who had been appointed to the seat by G M “Soapy” Williams, then in his second two-year term).