El-Sayed savours the prospect of Vance administering his Senate oath

The Michigan senator-elect calls the January ceremony a "delicious irony", then turns it into a Michigan-Ohio football joke.

Channel: BBC News · United KingdomStory of November 5, 2026Trari Newsroom

Why this story? One of BBC News's most watched videos since yesterday, with 176,692 views.

BBC News: The news channel of the BBC, Britain's public broadcaster, and one of the best-known news organisations in the world. 20M subscribers and 7.6B views.

El-Sayed says it's 'delicious irony' that 'JD, habibi' will swear him into US Senate. #BBCNews

January's Senate swearing-in ceremony gives Abdul El-Sayed an opportunity to needle Vice President JD Vance before he even takes office.

In a short victory-speech excerpt published by the United Kingdom's BBC News, the British Broadcasting Corporation's news service, Michigan's senator-elect addresses Vance as "JD", pauses, then adds "habibi" to laughter and cheers.

"There is this delicious irony in the fact that you're constitutionally obligated to swear me in in January," El-Sayed says. He smiles and applauds as the crowd responds.

There is a distinction behind the joke: vice presidents traditionally administer senators' oaths, but the Constitution does not require Vance personally to perform that task. Other senators can administer the oath too.

El-Sayed finishes with "Wolverine one, Buckeye zero." The reference turns his election victory into a college-football score: Michigan's Wolverines against Ohio State's Buckeyes, invoking the state Vance represented in the Senate before becoming vice president. El-Sayed steps away from the podium laughing.

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The numbers

The speech excerpt drew roughly 177,000 views since yesterday.

subscribers

20,200,000

no significant change in the last 7 days

total views

7,559,342,677

views per day

11,566,615

typical day: 4,672,891

the video

views

176,692

likes

3,818

comments

329

days online

1

subscribers: this channel and similar channels

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20,200,000

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Inside Edition

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Vox

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As of November 5, 2026 · Data source: Trari Social News, Trari Traffic Trends and Ranking Platform, Google YouTube

Subscriber, view, like and comment counts are YouTube's. Rates, usual days, rankings, comparisons and categories are Trari's own calculations.