The news comes after a Free Beacon report exposed El-Sayed’s leadership role with another anti-cop group that staged a deadly Detroit protest
Abdul El-Sayed, a candidate in the Democratic primary for Michigan’s open Senate seat in 2026, served on the board of a far-left climate group from 2019 to 2021, according to financial disclosure records reviewed by the Washington Free Beacon. During that time, the organization lobbied to “defund and abolish the police” and described cops as “fascist pigs.”
El-Sayed’s tenure on the board of the Sunrise Movement—which describes itself as a “movement of young people fighting to stop the climate crisis”—occurred as the group hosted “defund the police” seminars for activists, added “abolish the police” to a list of political goals on its website, and repeatedly used derogatory language to describe law enforcement officers in social media posts.
“F— THE POLICE!” the group wrote in one Sept. 23, 2020, post on X.
In other posts, the Sunrise Movement described cops as “Fascist pigs” who are “here to uphold and enforce white supremacy in our communities and nothing else.”
“DEFUND THE F—ING POLICE,” wrote the Sunrise Movement in another series of X posts in June 2020. “The police are only here to protect themselves and our white supremacist society.”
The Sunrise Movement also advocated for abolishing police and prisons as part of its climate activism.
“We cannot achieve climate justice without moving away from police and prisons,” the group wrote in a statement on its website, adding that police and prisons are “white supremacist institutions.”
In July 2020, the group hosted a “4 day crash course” to teach activists “tangible steps” on how to defund and abolish the police.
“[M]any people don’t realize that defunding the police is just one step towards abolition,” the group said in a Facebook post advertising the event. “We’re putting on a 4 day crash course … so we can deepen our understanding of abolition and learn how we can take tangible steps in our community to #DefundPolice.”
The revelation of El-Sayed’s leadership role with the Sunrise Movement adds to a growing list of connections to the “defund the police” movement. The far-left candidate has sought to distance himself from his anti-police rhetoric amid a competitive Democratic primary race against state senator Mallory McMorrow and Rep. Haley Stevens. CNN reported last month that El-Sayed had deleted dozens of social media posts in which he denounced law enforcement, called for police funding cuts, and described police departments as “standing armies.”
The Free Beacon reported soon after that El-Sayed was on the board of an anti-police group when it organized Detroit protests that turned deadly in May 2020. The event, which drew an estimated 1,000 protesters, later devolved into a riot, with activists defacing police cars and attacking officers with bottles, rocks, and other makeshift weapons. A police captain was hospitalized, at least 60 rioters were arrested, and a man was shot and killed after a gunman fired into the crowd, according to reports.
El-Sayed told the Detroit News that he never supported defunding the police, claiming what he really meant was that “we need to be making a lot more investments in things like quality education and housing.”
“I want to be clear, I actually never, never called for defunding,” he said. “My goal in that conversation was to help everybody to understand what we were talking about.”
El-Sayed’s campaign did not respond to Free Beacon requests for comment on his involvement with the initial anti-police group or with the Sunrise Movement.
The race for the open Michigan Senate seat in 2026 is expected to be one of the most competitive in the country, with the Democratic nominee likely facing off against former congressman Mike Rogers (R.).
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