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IrelandInside El-Sayed's Michigan win: groceries, healthcare and religious hostility
The Guardian's campaign documentary follows Oliver Laughland from a Mike Rogers rally to union canvassing and election-night celebrations in Detroit.
The Guardian
Story of Why this story? 968,090 views so far, and here is what is inside it.
How Abdul El-Sayed defeated Maga in Michigan | Anywhere but Washington
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- 0:53At Rogers' rally, attendees express hostility towards El-Sayed's Muslim faith and background.
- 4:10Security blocks Laughland's attempt to question Rogers about the campaign rhetoric.
- 6:08El-Sayed makes affordable healthcare, grocery costs and ending foreign wars central to his rally speech.
- 6:50UAW canvasser Maurice knocks on doors, bringing the campaign into conversations with working-class voters.
- 13:33Buttigieg argues that rejecting Trump does not automatically mean embracing Democrats.
- 14:15El-Sayed takes the stage to deliver his victory speech.
Michigan chose Abdul El-Sayed. The Guardian's Anywhere but Washington documentary retraces the closing campaign days that made him America's first Muslim US senator-elect, moving between hostility towards his faith and his campaign's emphasis on everyday costs.
Reporter Oliver Laughland and filmmaker Tom Silverstone begin with the victory, then rewind to a Mike Rogers rally in Macomb County. Attendees voice suspicion of El-Sayed's religion, and Rogers presents a mocking gift of Dubai chocolate. When Laughland tries to question the Republican candidate about the rhetoric outside the venue, security blocks his approach.
The contrast in Detroit is not simply between two candidates. El-Sayed's get-out-the-vote event centres on affordable healthcare, grocery bills and ending foreign wars. Outside, an 81-year-old psychoanalyst dressed as Spider-Man holds a sign telling people their vote is their superpower.
The report then leaves the rally stage for the doorstep. Laughland accompanies Maurice, a UAW canvasser, through working-class neighbourhoods as he tries to turn those campaign priorities into votes. One resident is comfortable with a measure of socialism; Maurice describes this as his proudest vote since first voting for Barack Obama.
That sequence gives the title's promise of explaining the win something concrete: campaign messages, organising and conversations with voters, rather than a statistical account of which groups decided the result.
The closing stretch alternates between the Democratic and Republican watch parties as results arrive. El-Sayed takes the stage for his victory speech near the end, completing a film that spends as much time with the people being asked for their votes as with the politicians seeking them.
An American politician and epidemiologist who is Michigan's US senator-elect.
More on Wikipedia ›A Republican who represented Michigan's 8th district in the US House from 2001 to 2015. He chaired the House Intelligence Committee from 2011 to 2015.
More on Wikipedia ›Published on Trari
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- Channel
- The Guardian
- Subscribers
- 2,660,000 ▲ 10,000 this week
- Channel views, last 7 days
- 3,025,284
- Channel views, pace per day
- 218,608 (on a normal day: 499,359)
- Video published
- November 4, 2026
- Video views so far
- 968,090 (6 days online)
- Video views, pace per day
- 56,956 (on a normal day: 285,118)
The numbers
The documentary has drawn close to a million views in six days. Its subject, rather than an unusual viewing surge, is the story here.
💡 Test your knowledge
The UAW, whose canvasser appears in the documentary, is most closely associated with which industry?
The UAW is the union commonly known as the United Auto Workers.