Abdul El-Sayed Defends Trans Rights in Hostile ’60 Minutes’ Interview
Michigan's Democratic Senate nominee pushed back against Ross Douthat, framing transgender rights as constitutional freedoms.
Michigan Democratic U.S. Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed refused to take the bait and throw the transgender community under the bus during a tense, often hostile interview with conservative commentator Ross Douthat for CBS’s 60 Minutes.
El-Sayed faces Republican neoconservative Mike Rogers in an expensive and contentious Senate race. He narrowly defeated U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens in a Democratic primary marked by clashes over policy, particularly U.S. support for Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
Since defeating Stevens, El-Sayed — who would be the first Muslim U.S. senator if elected — has been slammed by Rogers and other Republicans, including President Donald Trump, Vice President JD Vance, and Ohio U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno. Their attacks have included calling him a “jihadist,” accusing him of ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, casting him as a national security threat, and even arguing that he shouldn’t be considered an American citizen despite being born in the United States.
During the interview, Douthat challenged El-Sayed on several policy positions, including whether his Muslim faith conflicted with his progressive politics — a contention his detractors have used to justify their opposition to him.
“A lot of Muslims have, like a lot of Christians have, traditionalist conservative positions on issues like abortion, same-sex marriage, transgenderism,” Douthat said. “I’ve had Michigan Democrats tell me that Donald Trump made inroads with Muslim American voters in this state on those issues. Do you feel any tension between your faith and being part of and a champion of a very socially liberal and culturally liberal party?”
But El-Sayed rejected the apparent premise of Douthat’s question — that he would seek to impose his faith on others — and affirmed that all Americans, including transgender people, are entitled to individual rights.
“The minute you assent to government taking anybody’s rights, whether you use them or you don’t, you are assenting to government taking everybody’s rights,” he said. “And I believe in rights. And even though somebody might use rights that you don’t understand, you never mean to use yourself, you still got to show up and fight for those rights.”
He also pushed back when Douthat asked whether cultural liberalism could go wrong.
“As a matter of civic life, I stand for folks’ rights under the Constitution,” El-Sayed said. “I live my life a particular way, but I love that I get the choice of doing that, and that other people get the choice of doing what they choose to do. And I think that’s the beauty of this country.”
When Douthat pressed him again, El-Sayed replied: “You keep talking about cultural liberalism. I’m talking about constitutional rights. Culture is about choices that people ought to make. Constitutional rights are about the ability to make those choices. I will always fight for the ability to make choices, to live who you are. But I think at the end of the day, the question of culture and the question of politics are separate.”
Douthat then argued that rights can conflict on issues such as parents’ control over their children’s education and the inclusion of trans athletes in female-designated sports. But El-Sayed was skeptical.
“I think we manufacture these social issues,” he said.
He noted that in the digital age, children learn more about cultural issues from the internet and smartphones than from the classroom, despite conservative parents’ complaints about schools indoctrinating their children.
“The notion somehow that you are going to prevent your child from being exposed to something that you may find disagreeable and that is going to be because of school is so profoundly outdated, because of course you have all the information and they have all the information,” El-Sayed said.
“I think it’s really important for us to recognize that the free flow of information is actually a beautiful thing. It’s really important and the most important thing you can do is not try to protect a person from seeing a thing,” he continued. “It’s about trying to make sure that as you coach your kid through the world that you are engaging with them and saying ‘Here’s what I believe. Here’s what you may see in the world. You get to make your choices about who you’re going to be in the world.'”
El-Sayed then pivoted, arguing that culture-war debates distract from economic concerns.
“This debate about quote-unquote ‘what’s taught in a classroom,’ I think, has been made into a cultural flashpoint, because a lot of the folks who want to make this a topic of conversation don’t want to be talking about the real issues that we face in our lives,” he said.
“A lot of the culture-war issues that get fought right now are about trying to distract us from the fact that we can’t afford our gas, can’t afford our groceries, can’t see a doctor, are worried about whether or not our kids are going to have a good life. And instead, we’re out here talking about who gets to play what sport, which should be the question of the people who govern sports. I’m not running to govern sports.”
El-Sayed has resisted distancing himself from transgender rights as some other Democrats have done, transgender activist and journalist Erin Reed has noted on her Erin in the Morning Substack. That support undercuts Republican claims that he would impose Sharia law to subjugate women and LGBTQ people.
In August, Fox News host Jesse Watters asked El-Sayed whether he supported “sex changes for minors.” El-Sayed responded that “the government shouldn’t tell you what kind of health care you should have, and if you’re a minor, that’s between you and your doctor and your parents.”
A few weeks later, a Michigan State student asked El-Sayed about gender-affirming care. He responded: “I don’t think the government gets to have a say about what health care is provided in what circumstances and why.”
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