Abdul El-Sayed

Civil Rights

I understand that civil rights are just as important when they protect our rights to do things that others might disagree with. That’s why I believe that the right to speak against your government’s actions and to peacefully protest them are sacrosanct. And I stand against the weaponization of the state to stamp out or intimidate peaceful protest, including the freedom to boycott. Learn more

I oppose mandatory Voter ID laws like the “SAVE Act” that impose unnecessary barriers to citizens voting. Instead, I believe in making voting easier. Voters should be automatically registered to vote when they turn eighteen and reregistered automatically when they move. Election days should be holidays. And we need no-reason absentee and early in-person voting. Learn more

Defense / Veterans

As the former Director of Wayne County’s Veterans Services division, I hold solemn the commitment we have made to our veterans. I believe in expanding and improving the VA, not cutting it. I also believe that no veteran should go without housing, a good job, and an education. That’s why I support vastly expanding the services we provide our veterans to include them. Learn more

Economy

Trade deals, like NAFTA, have been a disaster for American manufacturing and have rotted out our towns and destroyed communities. I believe in bringing dignified, well-paying jobs to Michigan. That means investing in the research, development, and growth of the technologies of the future while using tools like tariffs in a steady, thoughtful, and targeted way to protect them as they grow. I believe that unions must have a significant voice at the tables where decisions about the future of our economy are being made. Learn more

Education

Believe in the right to literacy. That starts with universal childcare, universal pre-K, and public K-12 education that is comprehensive, empowering, and tailored to kids’ unique needs. I protected children in Detroit from lead in their schools, and I believe that we need a massive investment in school infrastructure–the buildings and community spaces that are so critical to the safety and security of children in the place we leave them, most of the day, most of the year. Rather than gutting the Department of Education, I will support public schools, protect the civil rights of children, respect and invest in our educators and staff, and fight to guarantee high-quality public education for all. Learn more

Environment / Energy

Data centers are among the most direct impacts of new technologies in the lives of everyday Michiganders. I support comprehensive federal zoning guidelines and legislation that protect communities from their unintended consequences. Toward that end, I created a leading edge policy proposal for “Terms of Engagement” for data centers that I intend to pass as federal law in the U.S. Senate. Learn more

Government Reform

The filibuster has been used by Senators to shield one another from having to take hard votes. I believe that it is antidemocratic and should be abolished. Learn more

I believe that congressional districts should be drawn by a federal nonpartisan committee of experts who are appointed for defined terms on a rolling basis and who work alongside the U.S. Census Bureau, similar to the Federal Reserve Board. This would come as close as possible to eliminating the partisan gerrymandering that exists because of apportionment by partisan state governments in most states. Learn more

I understand that the Supreme Court itself has become a major impediment to democracy. The Roberts court has moved to limit voting rights, civil rights, and reproductive rights while expanding Trump’s power. I support Supreme Court reform, including ending the life-time appointments, imposing limited terms, and allowing the same number of appointments for each presidential term. Learn more

To get corporate and special interest money out of politics, I support legislation to overturn the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision. In addition, I support banning outside spending through corporate 501(c)4s, SuperPACs, and 527 groups. I also support public election funding and campaign spending caps. Learn more

Healthcare

I oppose the hospital mergers and acquisitions that are leaving Americans with fewer healthcare choices and nurses, hospital workers, and doctors with less power at their workplace. I want to empower the FTC to retrospectively review mergers and acquisitions and grant them the power to break up monopolies in healthcare. I support the Break Up Big Medicine Act. Learn more

Appointments to critical leadership roles such as CDC Director, FDA Commissioner, and NIH Director should be similar to those for the FBI Director and Federal Reserve: they should be fixed-term appointments that cannot be removed except under specific circumstances. Further, any and all appointments to critical public health bodies, such as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, should be made with the expressed consent of the Senate to protect their integrity. Learn more

I support expanding that law to empower Medicare to negotiate prices for every single prescription drug, negotiate prices far earlier after drugs hit the market, and extend the ability to negotiate prices to all patients, not just those on Medicare. I also support public manufacturing of essential medications, such as insulin. I’ll take on the practice of excessive drug patents to stop Big Pharma from using legal tactics to extend their patents. And I will Ban the Middleman, ending pharmacy benefit managers who price-gouge us while offering no essential benefit. Learn more

Expanding Medicare and providing it to every single American would make it stronger. As a nation, Americans hold more than 225 billion in medical debt. I think it shouldn’t exist–and I erased it for upwards of 300,000 Michiganders in Wayne County. I favor abolishing it for every American immediately. Learn more

I believe that healthcare decisions should always stay between an individual and their doctor. And I believe that the government cannot and should not interfere with the right to pursue healthcare choices. Healthcare data must remain private, and state and federal government should have no right to access your data unless it’s for the purposes of providing you healthcare. And healthcare providers should be protected from undue coercion by the government to provide data or to provide, or not provide, healthcare they deem necessary for their patients. Learn more

Further, I oppose any effort to criminalize certain medications and the use of lawfare or funding cuts to stop healthcare providers from providing full-spectrum healthcare that meet all the needs of their diverse communities. Learn more

Housing

Homelessness is an American crisis–and it’s a housing issue. Too many Americans are priced out of the most basic necessity of shelter. And working people can’t afford housing in the communities in which they work. I aim to solve it. We need a building boom. And to create that we need to massively invest in building new housing in communities across the country, and to streamline local regulations that are making it way too hard to build anything in America. I’ll stand up to the corporate profiteers who are on the wrong side of affordable housing. I want to ban large corporations that speculate on our housing stock from owning homes at all. Learn more

Will support federal legislation to ban algorithmic rental price-fixing software that allows corporate landlords to collude to raise rent. I want to require Big Tech companies like AirBnB and VRBO to pay special housing dislocation fees for the housing stock they occupy in local communities. And I will stand up to corporate landlords against unfair evictions that are forcing too many Americans onto the streets. Toward that end, I believe we need a federal renter bill of rights that protects renters from exploitation and clarifies the obligations for landlords across the country. Learn more

Legislation

Rather than replace us, AI should be a tool to enhance our lives. Further, the speed and lack of transparency with which these technologies are being developed opens the door to serious risks that powerful AI may fall into the wrong hands or escape human control altogether. That’s why I support legislation to create guardrails around when, how, and for what purposes AI is deployed. And I oppose efforts to pre-empt state action without federal legislation in place. Learn more

Taxes / Budget

Research and development are among America’s most important assets. Rather than gut critical research agencies like the National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health and pull back from funding research laboratories in universities across America, I believe that our future requires us to invest more and faster. And he believes that the taxpayers who fund this research should earn back the returns on their investment. Learn more

To address the risk of massive automation of our jobs, I support exploring income protection programs such as wage insurance and basic income, worker investment through unions, adjusting our tax system to stop penalizing human employment and rewarding automation, and investment in small business revolving loan funds. Learn more

Support taxing capital gains over 1 million at the same rate as ordinary income and closing the stepped-up basis loophole. I also support taxing inheritance greater than 1 million like ordinary income and imposing a progressive tax on wealth held by trusts. I support raising the marginal tax rate on earnings over 1 million and a billionaire tax on wealth over 1 billion. In addition, I support a cost of living exemption on federal taxes up to 50,000. I’ll also fight to close the Social Security payroll tax cap to make sure the rich pay their fair share so that Social Security stays solvent well into the future. Learn more

Wages / Job Benefits

Teachers deserve to be paid more. So I support raising the minimum salary for teachers to at least 60,000/year. I also support more investment in paraprofessionals, including nurses, psychologists, social workers, and behavioral health specialists, so that all students have access to wraparound services that are critical to ensuring a healthy and productive learning environment. Learn more