Abdul El-Sayed, a leading contender in Michigans Democratic Senate primary, has proudly recounted that as a college athlete he refused to face the American flag during the national anthem in protest of the Iraq war, a stance that underscores his long record of contempt for traditional patriotic norms.
According to the Washington Free Beacon, El-Sayed detailed the episode in his 2020 memoir, *Healing Politics: A Doctor's Journey Into the Heart of Our Political Epidemic*, casting his defiance of the flag as a badge of honor rather than a moment of youthful excess.
"It was 2004, in the thick of the Iraq war, and I had taken to showing my opposition to the war by choosing not to face the flag during the national anthem prior to our games," he wrote, adding, "As any kind of demonstration involving the flag and the anthem often does, my choices offended many of my teammates: they couldn't understand how or why I felt this way."
El-Sayed has since defended that conduct as an expression of higher patriotism, insisting that his refusal to honor the flag was rooted in love of country rather than disdain.
"As I tried to explain, I love AmericaI always have," he wrote. "But I love it enough to demand it to be better, and to believe it can be."
His actions, however, ran directly counter to the U.S. Flag Code, which sets out widely accepted standards for respecting the national anthem and the flag.
Under 36 U.S. Code 301, when the anthem is played and the flag is displayed, "persons present should face the flag and stand at attention with their right hand over the heart," a guideline that, while not legally enforceable, reflects a longstanding civic expectation that public figures typically respect rather than flout.
El-Sayed has also aligned himself with the broader left-wing protest culture that treats the anthem and the flag as platforms for grievance politics.
He praised former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernicks decision to kneel during the anthem, writing, "This was many years before Colin Kaepernick would bravely kneel during the national anthem in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, igniting a national firestorm," and implicitly crediting himself with having pioneered the gesture.
The resurfacing of these comments comes as prominent Obama-era aides turned podcastersJon Favreau, Jon Lovett, and Ben Rhodeshave rallied behind El-Sayeds Senate bid, giving him valuable exposure in a crowded Democratic field.
Yet his history of flag protests and anti-establishment rhetoric threatens to cement his image as a far-left radical, a label reinforced by his repeated willingness to equate American policy with some of historys darkest atrocities.
In now-deleted posts on X, El-Sayed drew a moral equivalence between the September 11 terrorist attacks and the subsequent U.S.-led war on terror, suggesting both were "perpetrated ignorantly" and fueled by "tribalistic grievance," as previously reported by the Washington Free Beacon.
"Today, I mourn the 3K lives, 6K injuries, & infrastructural devastation in NYC, perpetrated ignorantly in the name of my faith," he wrote on the 20th anniversary of 9/11. "Tomorrow, I'll mourn ~1M lives, millions of injuries, & infrastructural devastation in 3 countries, perpetrated ignorantly in the name of my country."
He went further by likening the war on terror to slavery, Jim Crow, and the forced removal of Native Americans, casting Americas response to Islamist terrorism as an "echo" of its most shameful chapters.
The war on terror, he wrote, was an "echo of the worst of our historythe decimation of Native Americans, the Transatlantic Slave Trade, Jim Crow segregation, Japanese interment [sic]," and he even compared efforts to bar courts from applying Sharia law to the Trail of Tears, drawing a parallel between an Oklahoma ballot measure and the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.
El-Sayeds foreign-policy rhetoric has followed a similar pattern of blaming the United States and its allies while downplaying or omitting the role of terrorist actors.
In October, on the second anniversary of the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks, he sent a fundraising email that faulted Israel for the war in Gaza without acknowledging the massacre of Israeli civilians that triggered the conflict, a framing that aligns closely with the progressive lefts most strident anti-Israel voices.
His domestic record is equally steeped in the language of radical activism, particularly on law enforcement.
El-Sayed has a documented history of supporting "defund the police" efforts, and CNN reported last year that he had scrubbed dozens of social media posts in which he denounced police, called for cutting their budgets, and labeled departments "standing armies."
Further reporting by the Free Beacon revealed that El-Sayed served on the board of an anti-police organization that helped organize Detroit protests in May 2020, demonstrations that turned deadly as unrest escalated.
He also sat on the board of a far-left climate group that openly lobbied to "defund" and "abolish the police" and referred to officers as "fascist pigs," placing him squarely within the activist fringe that seeks to dismantle traditional public safety institutions rather than reform them.
For Michigan voters weighing who should represent them in the U.S. Senate, El-Sayeds own words and affiliations present a clear picture of a candidate whose instincts run against patriotic convention, law-and-order priorities, and a sober view of Americas role in the world.
His campaign declined to respond to a request for comment, leaving his published recordfrom turning his back on the flag to equating U.S. counterterrorism with slavery and genocideto speak for itself as Democrats decide whether this brand of politics reflects the values they want to send to Washington.
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