Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed on Monday shot back at Vice President Vance’s comment about him being “very, very evil.” Earlier Monday, Vice President Vance went after El-Sayed at a rally in Detroit, calling him…
Page A8From§Eachthe wee small hours edition — 1 September 2026
Vance calls Senate rival evil in same closed-door speech where he offers Jewish Republicans an olive branch.
As it ran on the front
I wrote this down, hold on, let me find the page — here it is: JD Vance, speaking to Jewish Republicans, defends his approach to antisemitism, and in the same set of remarks calls his Michigan Senate opponent 'evil.' Same room. Same speech. I keep coming back to that one word, evil, because it's not a word you use about a policy position, it's a word you use about a person, and the record has him using it about Abdul El-Sayed by name.
My wife says I get fixated on single words, and maybe she's right, but stay with me. Evil. It's a heavy word, the heaviest one in the room that night, heavier than 'concerned' or 'disagree' or even 'dangerous.' You don't reach for evil by accident. You reach for it when the room wants red meat, and apparently the room got some, because the very same remarks — this part's also in the record — include Vance offering an olive branch to pro-Israel Republicans in that closed-door speech.…
…(cont) Here's the household version, because I like to work these things out with what's in the kitchen: I've got an olive branch in one hand, that's easy, everybody knows what that looks like, it's the thing you extend. And I've got the word evil in the other hand. Try holding both at once. Go ahead, I'll wait. It's not that you can't do it — you can, people do it all the time in politics, one hand for the base, one hand for the room — it's that when you open both hands at the same time, in the same fifteen minutes, in front of the same audience, the two things sit right next to each other whether you meant them to or not.
El-Sayed's response is in the record too: what's evil is corrupting yourself. I don't know what he meant by that exactly. I just know he said it back.
So here's what I keep circling, notebook open, pencil down — excuse me, before you go: did the olive branch and the word 'evil' arrive in the same remarks, to the same room, on the same night? Because that's what I've got written down here, and I'd like someone to tell me I copied it wrong.
“Calling your opponent evil to a room full of donors isn't a gaffe, it's the product — it's what the room paid to hear — and the olive branch that follows in the same fifteen minutes tells you who the apology was actually for. It wasn't for El-Sayed.”
“The Vice President was speaking to the seriousness of the moment, using strong language about a serious disagreement, not about the man personally — well, he did use the man's name, so it was about the man, but the point stands, the point being — the point.”
The receipts
Vice President JD Vance’s speech at the Republican Jewish Coalition leadership summit Monday was met with applause from the group’s leaders.
Vice President JD Vance also told Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan’s Democratic Senate nominee, to “keep my wife’s name out of your mouth.”
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.