The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!
The Daily BS • Bo Snerdley Cuts Through It!

Get my Daily BS twice-a-day news stack directly to your email.


El-Sayed aide sees a Ford truck — and somehow gets KKK cross-burning vibes

by

BS BULLETIN

  • An Abdul El-Sayed political manager compared Mike Rogers’ campaign imagery to a “KKK cross burning” after Rogers rode in an antique Ford pickup at the Woodward Dream Cruise.
  • Rogers’ team promptly added “Old Ford trucks” to its running list of things it says El-Sayed’s camp hates.
  • El-Sayed’s campaign says the aide’s post represented his personal views.

Apparently, an antique Ford pickup, two American flags and a Toby Keith song are no longer simply a Saturday afternoon in Michigan.

To at least one political manager working for Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed, they apparently evoke the Ku Klux Klan.

The latest flare-up in Michigan’s increasingly nasty U.S. Senate race began after Republican nominee Mike Rogers posted a video Sunday from the Woodward Dream Cruise, the legendary Detroit-area celebration of classic cars. Rogers could be seen riding shotgun in a red antique Ford pickup with American flags flying from the back as Toby Keith’s “American Ride” played.

“Gotta love this American Ride!” Rogers wrote. “There’s no better way to do the Woodward Dream Cruise!”

Mason Pressler, identified by Fox News as El-Sayed’s political manager in northern Michigan, saw something considerably darker.

“Mike Rogers’ campaign has the aesthetics of a 1960s white flight suburb and a KKK cross burning,” Pressler wrote on X.

Yes. A Ford truck. At the Woodward Dream Cruise. In Michigan.

Rogers’ campaign wasted little time turning the attack back on El-Sayed’s team, accusing Pressler of believing that “driving a Michigan-made Ford truck is akin to the KKK.” The campaign then added “Old Ford trucks” to its tongue-in-cheek running list of things it says El-Sayed dislikes.

El-Sayed communications director Roxie Richner told Fox News that Pressler’s remarks did not represent the campaign, pointing to the disclaimer in his X biography saying his opinions are his own. Fox reported that Richner did not respond to a subsequent request for additional comment about the post.

The dust-up comes at a particularly important moment for El-Sayed. He emerged from the August 4 Democratic primary as the party’s nominee and now faces Rogers in November in one of the country’s closely watched Senate contests. The Associated Press described El-Sayed’s victory as a major win for the Democratic Party’s progressive wing.

But the general election has already taken a decidedly different tone.

Republicans are moving aggressively to define El-Sayed before he can introduce himself to a broader electorate. Axios reported last week that the Republican-aligned Senate Leadership Fund was pouring another $6 million into Michigan advertising as part of an August offensive aimed at El-Sayed and other progressive Democrats.

El-Sayed, meanwhile, has been trying to bring Democrats together after a bruising primary. He told the AP that he recently had a “really warm and inspiring” conversation with former President Barack Obama and said he hoped Obama would campaign with him.

That unity project has been complicated by El-Sayed’s association with socialist streamer Hasan Piker, who campaigned with him during the primary and appeared at a Detroit gathering for campaign-supporting content creators immediately before Election Day.

Piker infamously said in 2019 that “America deserved 9/11,” although he later walked back the remark. Importantly, PolitiFact found that El-Sayed himself did not make that statement, despite attacks attempting to attribute Piker’s words to the candidate.

Asked by CNN after the primary whether he would renounce Piker, El-Sayed responded that he was “less focused on folks who are campaigning with me, more focused on the folks I’m campaigning to.”

Piker isn’t exactly disappearing, either. In a new interview published this week, he defended the growing progressive and democratic-socialist movement and argued that establishment narratives declaring it politically doomed are premature.

All of which makes the Pressler episode especially revealing about how quickly this campaign may become a cultural brawl.

Rogers is clearly leaning into Michigan Americana: Ford trucks, American flags, classic cars and Toby Keith.

And one member of El-Sayed’s political operation responded by invoking white flight and the KKK. That is quite a way to begin a general election campaign in the state that put America on wheels.

MY QUICK TAKE:

I have questions.

If an old Ford pickup is now giving Democrats “KKK cross burning” vibes, what happens when somebody drives a Chevy?

Do we call the Southern Poverty Law Center?

This was the Woodward Dream Cruise, for crying out loud. Classic cars are the entire point. Mike Rogers wasn’t cruising around in a white hood. He was riding in an old Ford with American flags while Toby Keith played.

That used to be called “Michigan.”

Apparently now it requires a trigger warning.

And you have to admire the political brilliance here. Nothing says “We understand Michigan voters” quite like looking at the state that gave America Ford Motor Company and announcing that an old Ford truck reminds you of the Klan.

Keep going, fellas. Maybe next week someone can denounce apple pie as a hate symbol and accuse the bald eagle of microaggressions.

DBS WIRE SOURCES:

today’s hot news