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Why you’re not allowed to vote for the Michigan populist
Ken Klippenstein Oct 27 2026
Abdul-El Sayed campaigning for Michigan’s U.S. Senate seat
For daily coverage of next week’s elections and access to my private chat discussing them, please become a paid subscriber (you can also chip in via my GoFundMe here) — Ken
“Jihadist,” “Muslim Brotherhood guy,” “on the side of the terrorists” — these are the kinds of smears Donald Trump is deploying against Abdul El-Sayed.
There’s the naked racism, of course, but also the insinuation that El-Sayed’s candidacy represents a national security crisis. “He would be the only senator that will have to go through a metal detector before he’s allowed to go into the Senate,” Trump said Sunday at a rally for El-Sayed’s opponent.
A quarter century after 9/11 and we still have to pass through metal detectors to get on a plane. Now the government wants your vote to pass through the same security theater, too.
Like Trump, Washington’s case against the 41-year-old populist candidate for Michigan’s U.S. Senate seat doesn’t bother with policy or positions. It just says how dangerous he is to “national security” — and by extension, how unqualified you are to understand the dangers.
“Abdul El-Sayed’s radical ideology is a threat to our national security,” El-Sayed’s opponent, former Congressman Mike Rogers, said. Rogers is a former FBI agent and served as the Republican chair of the House Intelligence Committee.
The casual racism isn’t new, but the attempt to dignify it with security-speak is. It’s absurd on two levels. First, the rhetoric I’ve quoted isn’t saying any of El-Sayed’s policies or positions are dangerous; they’re saying he himself is, as if he’s going to take to the floor of Congress wearing a suicide vest. Second, it takes what is supposed to be an exercise of popular will and turns it into a “national security” matter that is technical in nature.
Imagine applying literally any other type of technical standard to a politician is and the absurdity becomes apparent. ‘Abdul El-Sayed’ — not his policies but the man himself — ‘is a threat to municipal wastewater management.’ ‘He’s a destabilizing influence on air traffic control.’ ‘He’s an existential threat to the nation’s bridge integrity.’
Saying a political candidate is a threat to national security is just as silly; but because it’s language we’re so used to hearing from Washington, the insanity of it barely registers. Washington loves the national security frame because it doesn’t stir up much interest among ordinary people, unlike issues like affordability and healthcare — the centerpiece of El-Sayed’s campaign. It’s a ploy to shift the debate from concerns that the public has to that of think tank “experts” and the professional commentators.
In one of the funnier demonstrations of this, the Washington Times recently published a letter to the editor from a former Defense Intelligence Agency officer raising the question surely on the mind of Michigan voters: can El-Sayed pass a background investigation for a security clearance?
Per the letter:
“I question whether he could pass even a basic security clearance review, let alone get within a mile of the kind of classified material to which Mike Rogers had accessed in the U.S. House.”
Set aside for a moment the creepiness of the idea that elected officials should need approval from the national security bureaucracy to know things, which isn’t a thing (yet). Imagine any other type of certification or credential being applied to an election. For example: ‘I question whether Abdul El-Sayed could pass a forklift operator certification, let alone get within a mile of the heavy machinery to which Mike Rogers had access.’
It’s laughable. And yet, it’s the go-to attack from not only El-Sayed’s opponent, but the President and other top officials, including sitting senators.
“Chuck Schumer could place Abdul El-Sayed on the Senate Intelligence Committee,” Senator Ted Cruz said recently, going on to warn of the grave danger to our beloved troops:
“He would have access to the very highest level of classified materials. And I believe, if that were to happen, there would be an unacceptably high risk that American servicemen and women, their lives would be endangered, and that our covert intelligence assets, their lives would be in danger because [there’s] every reason to believe Abdul El-Sayed would share that classified information with Muslim Brotherhood terrorists.”
Covert intelligence assets. Access to the very highest level. Classified information. Is this an election or a Tom Clancy novel?
In other words, you can’t vote for this guy not because of his policy positions or how he might vote in Congress but because he might divulge state secrets to an organization that he has consistently denounced. Oh, the horror (just in time for Halloween)!
Senator Tim Sheehy of Montana, who sits on the Armed Services Committee, says much the same, warning of the “serious national security questions” raised by El-Sayed’s character:
“Abdul El-Sayed’s ties to this group raise serious national security questions. As senators, we have access to some of our nation’s most sensitive, classified information, and I have serious concerns about the security risks posed by anyone associated with such a group serving in the Senate.”
I could go on and on like this but you get the idea. It’s spitting in the face of not just El-Sayed but anyone who thinks they’re capable of choosing who to vote for without the help of mommy and daddy in D.C.
For daily coverage of next week’s elections and access to my private chat discussing them, please become a paid subscriber (you can also chip in via my GoFundMehere) — Ken
In 2018 global trade union federations and their affiliates in the care sectors came together to discuss on strategies to highlight the plight of care workers and the need for decent work in the sectors where care is delivered (from child care to social care, long-term care to elderly care, etc).
One of the highlight of our resolutions was to set aside a day of solidarity with care workers. The momentum of moblisation around that day, and how COVID-19 foregrounded issues of care, informed the United Nations General Assembly’s declaration of 29 October as the International Day of Care and Support.
Nonetheless, the struggle for decent work, respect and dignity for those who as workers care for all remains of crucial importance in the face of austerity measures and attacks on public services and the very ethos of the commons which public services carries.
It is in the light of this and also within the context of the newly launched report of the World Health Organization (WHO) on policy options for integrating the health and care workforce (find attached) that we invite you to register and join the PSI webinar (see equally attached) taking place tomorrow 28 October (i.e., a day ahead of the 2026 International Day of Care and Support, where we will be engaging physically in several parts of the world as well).
We will also present the WHO policy options, which is a report of the 3-year Technical Advisory Group of the WHO on integrating the health and care workforce, with PSI involved as the global voice of the organised health and care workers.
For the concept note and to join the meeting which takes place at 12:00-14:30 CET tomorrow, register now
The recent high school and student protests in France have a simple objective: to get more resources for education. France’s education crisis is defined by severe teacher shortages, deteriorating student outcomes, and massive funding deficits spanning primary schools to public universities. State education in France is among the most unequal in the developed world: schools in poorer areas are so under-resourced that the education system is cementing inequality. Students from the poorest neighbourhoods are disproportionately hard hit by staff shortages.
French students have experienced a catastrophic and unprecedented 20% drop in the education budget per student since 2017. As French leftist economist Thomas Piketty put it: “The government, in bad faith, sometimes boasts that the nominal budget for higher education rose from €13.3 billion to €15.5 billion between 2017 and 2026 (+17%). That is true, except that inflation over the same period was 22%, meaning the budget actually fell by 5% in real terms. Add to this that the number of students rose from 2.6 million to over 3 million, an increase of 15%. The result is that the budget per student dropped by about 20%”.https://lucaschancel.com/etudiants/.
Research by the economist Asma Benhenda, based on payroll data from the French national education system, shows that the proportion of contract or beginning teachers in privileged areas like Paris or Hauts-de-Seine is just 10%. That figure rises to 50% in poorer departments, like Seine-Saint-Denis and Val-de-Marne, around the capital. The average salary per secondary school teacher is about 20% lower in the poorest areas than in the wealthiest, even after taking into account the (meager) bonuses awarded for priority education.
French teachers’ salaries consistently fall below the average for advanced economies (OECD). A French teacher with 15 years’ experience earns less than €40,000, 20% below average. Early-career teachers in Germany earn twice as much as their French counterparts. Yet French teachers have to cope with longer hours of teaching and some of the worst pupil-teacher ratios in Europe. As a result, record numbers are leaving the profession.
To plug staffing gaps, the government launched a scheme in 2022 to recruit “contract” teachers (as opposed to the standard tenure system, under which they count as fonctionnaires or civil servants). They were given four days’ training, despite often having no previous teaching experience. Predictably many quit within six months, owing to lack of adequate training or supervision.
No wonder then that, as state schools slowly disintegrate, more prosperous families are turning to private education. Few government ministers have any direct experience of the state school system as many go to posh private schools. Yet these fee-paying schools also receive public funding. Meanwhile French public universities are grappling with with an estimated €8 billion shortfall, which has pushed nearly all 75 public institutions into deficit budgets.
Christine Renon, the head of an infant school in Seine-Saint-Denis, died by suicide at her workplace in 2019. According to a letter she had sent to the school management board, she was “exhausted”. She went on to detail the deficiencies and inadequate resources of an organisation that had been left to rot. This tragedy should have shocked the authorities into a profound reappraisal. Macron pledged to make education a priority for his second presidential term. But nothing has changed for the better, only for the worse.
It’s education that primarily worries students and teachers (and parents) in France, But education is just one aspect of the deterioration of basic public services in France. France used to have a healthcare system that was the envy of the world, let alone Europe. Spending was high at 11.5% of annual GDP. As a result, life expectancy was much higher than the EU average. But over the last few decades, government healthcare spending has been cut back well below the increased demand for health service as French people get older and subsuequently need health support. Before 2008, health spending was rising at 0.3% of GDP a year. Since 2009, the rate of health spending growth has halved to just 0.17% of GDP a year. And yet the share of over 65s in France has risen 40% over the same period, or more than ten times the rise in health spending. As a result, life expectancy has virtually stopped rising. (at the bottom in figure below).
Annual growth in health expenditure per capita (real terms), 2014‑2019 and 2019‑2024 – source OECD
Just as in all the major capitalist economies, The cost of living for the average French household has risen sharply, especially since the end of the pandemic slump that saw a significant inflation spike, and now more recently compounded by the energy shortages from the ongoing Iran war. Price levels for average French households are now some 18-20% higher than just four years ago and are beginning to rise again from the Iran war. Real wages (after inflation) are up only 2.4% from five years ago and wage levels are still below where they were after the pandemic. Pouvoir d’achat is continually falling.
After taking into account tax and benefits, the growth in average disposable income (GDI) for French households has been on downward trend in the first three decades of this century, slowing to under 1% a year under the Macron presidency.
In 2024, 9.8 million people living in ordinary housing in metropolitan France were living below the monetary poverty threshold (1,337 euros per month). The poverty rate is at its highest level (15.4%) since 1996, the year the series began. The unemployed and single-parent families remained the groups most affected by poverty.
Although inequalities of income and wealth in France are not nearly so extreme as in the United States, they are still grotesque. Indeed, inequality has worsened in the last 40 years. In 1983, the top 1% of income earners took 7.5% of all personal income, 10% took 30%, and the bottom 50% received just 21.4%. By 2022, the top 1% took 12.7% (an over 60% increase), while the top 10% share rose to 34.8% and the bottom 50% share fell to 20.3%. Inequality of wealth (net personal wealth) is, as usual in all major economies, much worse. In 1983, the top 1% of wealth holders owned 15.9% of all personal wealth in France, the top 10% had 50%, and the bottom 50% held just 8.9%. By 2022, those inequalities got even worse. The top 1% of wealth holders now had 24% (over a 60% increase), the top 10% now owned 57.7%, and the bottom 50% saw their share of personal wealth fall to just 5.1% (a 48% decline).
Retirement and pensions are key issues for working people. Pensions are not ‘welfare’ benefits, but ‘deferred’ wages deducted in contributions from current wages in order to provide a decent life in old age. French workers have fought over many decades to achieve pensions at a reasonable retirement age. France allocates around 14% of its GDP to pensions, one of the highest rates in Europe and significantly higher than countries like the UK, which spends around 5% of its GDP and so delivers the lowest state pension in the advanced capital world. But contribution rates (deferred wages), from workers and their employers, are correspondingly high at 28 per cent.
French businesses and successive governments have spent much energy over the last few decades trying to reverse these pension rights by a combination of increased contributions, reduced pensions in real terms and by extending the retirement age. The argument of governments including the Macron administration is that an ageing society can no longer afford these ‘generous’ pensions. They argue that the pension system faces ‘structural deficits’ ie the payouts are now regularly exceeding the contributions.
When Emmanuel Macron ran for re-election in 2022, he told voters that the retirement age would have to rise to ensure the continued viability of the country’s pensions system. He forced through a change in the retirement age from 62 to 64 years. But raising the retirement age and cutting pensions in real terms will significantly hit French people’s living standards when they retire.
Again, as in many other countries in Europe, France is experiencing a deepening housing crisis. There are 2 million requests for social housing pending; they will never see their needs met. Rising rent prices, inflation, and economic pressure are pushing families to the edge like never before. From overcrowded cities to skyrocketing living costs, the situation is becoming impossible for millions. Millions of French citizens are now being forced to live in their cars as the housing crisis across France continues to spiral out of control.
In sum, France’s public services: social care, roads, transport, youth facilities, garbage collections, sewage and water supply etc have been deterorating for decades. Government after government responds by saying that these services are no longer ‘affordable’. And their mainstream economist apologists argue that the huge rise in public sector debt and continual annual budget deficits must be ended. Over the past 15 years, the public debt ratio (debt to GDP) has risen significantly. French public debt reached 119% of GDP in mid-2026 and is expected to increase to 121.7% in 2027.
Austerity is the message of the Macron government: there is no alternative, the public is told. The draft budget aims to reduce the public deficit to 5% of GDP in 2027, after 5.4% in 2026 and 5.1% in 2025. This requires €43bn of new measures. Without them, the government estimates that the deficit would reach around 6.5% next year. The ‘new measures’ would be the elimination of 3,000 civil service jobs by 2027 without replacement; a cap on government healthcare spending at €5 billion; reductions in unemployment insurance and pension schemes; the elimination of two national holidays (Victory Day and Easter Monday) to increase productivity; and yet again further reductions in regional and local expenditures.
Of course, there is one part of public spending that will not be cut: defence. At Bastille Day 2025, Macron announced that France’s military budget will reach €64 billion by 2027, three years ahead of schedule. Specifically, €3.5 billion will be added this year, and another €3 billion in 2027; all to meet the NATO pledge to increase national member defence spending to 5% of GDP by 2035 (3.5% for military expenses and 1.5% for infrastructure). As a key NATO member perceiving the ‘Russian threat’ as acute, Macron has committed to meeting this target.
Le Monde, the French mainstream news source, reckons that France’s “top priority must be to reassure investors of its ability to repair its finances.” So the financial markets rule. But all this talk of profligate public spending and debt is a false flag by French governments and the ‘bond vigilantes’ in financial markets who are selling French government bonds and increasing the cost of borrowing for governments and households alike.
What is always ignored is that France’s non-financial private-sector debt is actually much larger than public sector debt. The former reached 134.2% of GDP in 2026, more than 30% higher than the average in the euro area It is the private sector (with real estate and financial speculative borrowing) that is most vulnerable, And when a financial crash occurs in the capitalist system, it is the public sector that must bail out the private banks or major lenders. And in capitalist slumps, the government must spend more on unemployment benefits and take in less in taxes, so government deficits spiral.
The history of France’s public debt shows that it is in periods of capitalist slumps and financial crises, that public debt rises the most and then afterwards bond holders demand that the rest of us reduce this debt by cutting services and pensions and raising taxes. After the 1980-82 slump, faster economic growth and austerity measures stopped the debt ratio rising by 1987. Then the next slump of 1991-3 accelerated the rise in debt again before economic recovery (and more austerity measures) eventually led to a fall in the debt ratio. Then the global financial crash and the ensuing Great Recession led to a 20% rise in the debt ratio. Severe austerity measures during the slow growth Long Depression of the 2010s eventually stopped any further rise in the debt ratio before the pandemic slump drove it up again. What this shows is that without the impact of several crises in capitalism, the government debt to GDP ratio would have hardly risen. Each batch of austerity measures aims to reduce the public debt ratio originally caused by busts in the private sector, where the debt goes on rising.
Source: IMF, author
The real cause of France’s affordability crisis is its signficant economic slowdown. In the 21st century, France has experienced low real GDP growth: steadily falling over the last forty years. And now in the 2020s, it has virtually ground to a halt.
France: average annual real GDP growth (percent). Source: IMF
Take pensions, If France’s economic growth was only 1% pt a year higher than the current average of 1.5%, that would raise E30bn a year in government revenues, rising to E40bn by 2035. At current contribution rates, that would raise an extra E10bn a year from pension contributions, easily reversing the projected deficits. “The basic problem is that the economy hasn’t grown fast enough,” says Rupert Watson, global head of economics at Mercer. “It’s not what pensioners get that is causing the problem — it’s the lack of economic growth.”
As in the other G7 economies, this slowdown arises from weak investment growth. Falling productive investment growth generally leads to stagnating labour productivity, and France is no exception. Indeed, total factor productivity (a measure of the impact of “innovation”) is now falling absolutely.
France: average annual growth in fixed investment (percent). Source: AMECO; author’s calculations
Behind any relative stagnation in investment and productivity growth lies falling profitability of French capital. French capital’s profitability started to decline sharply at the beginning of the 21st century (on the advent of the euro) and gathered pace after the Great Recession. Average profitability is now near an all-time low after a fall during the pandemic slump.
France: rate of profit on net fixed assets (percent). Source: EPWT 7.0 series, AMECO; author’s calculations
What is to be done? In April-May 2027 France holds elections for the presidency and parliament. Current opinion polls suggest that the anti-immigrant, racist National Rally led by the veteran Marine Le Pen is well ahead and will win the first round for the presidency. But what is the main plank of Marine Le Pen’s economic programme if she wins the presidency next April? Fiscal austerity! She is promising €136bn cuts in public spending as well as the privatisation and closure of various state assets in order to bring government expenditure below 50% of GDP by 2032. National Rally claims that reducing immigration and stopping payments to the European Union will solve the debt crisis.
The bottom photo shows Eddie Abbott, administrator of the Facebook page Metro Detroit Memories, which recently posted about Walter Reuther's death in Pellston. The post is full of falsehoods and disinformation. He wouldn't let me post a comment and blocked me from commenting. https://www.facebook.com/groups/527831915882804/user/100081812670716/
His Facebook profile:
Intelligence Analysts. Former Disc Jockey and one hell of a guy!!! Have 2 degrees, multiple certifications and I’m Retired! Empathic, psychic Admin of Memories Of Metro Detroit since November 14, 2022. Intelligence Analyst at Retired Military
The Metro Detroit Memories Facebook page started in 2022 and, with an expansive advertising budget, now has 89,000 followers. El Golpe was published in February 2022 and has a chapter on Reuther's mysterious death.
This leads me to the inescapable conclusion that government intelligence is running an operation on the new evidence of Reuther's assassination. On the bright side, Abbott looks like a MAGA cutthroat!
Today, the support for the definition of anti-semitism to include any criticism of Israel or Xionism by right wing forces like the Daily Mail and many other mainstream outlets is political.
British colonialism supported the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire after WW1. The first British governor of Jerusalem referred to the creation of a Jewish state in the midst of an Arab population as, “Our loyal little Ulster in the Middle East”. Not only would British (then US) imperialism gain a foothold in an important region of the world next to the Suez canal, it would help the Jew-hating British ruling class rid Europe of its “Jewish problem”.
From what I understand there is considerable Jewish opposition to the definition of antisemitism that Richard Sanders mentions in the video, particularly from those on the left. We have a bizarre situation with this conflation of opposition to Israel with anti-semitism where Jews that have fought racism all their lives being expelled from the Labor Party for criticizing a gen*cide.
Those Jews that defend Israel’s crimes against humanity are placing the Jewish population as a whole in danger and are helping the anti-semites especially the British ruling class that would turn on the Jewish population without hesitation if the situation demanded it. The Tiger’s spots have not changed.
Past, Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) organiser. Presently part of 230 fightback
Ontario Canada.
Oct.19 2026
On the Primacy of Building Movements and the Limits of Electorialism
I’m not posting this commentary to suggest that we should reject participation in electoral processes but I do want to offer some comments on a question that a lot of my Facebook friends friends don’t really grapple with enough.
Whenever an avowedly progressive figure runs for office, you can chart the course of a process of growing disappointment that begins with great hopes, goes over to a grim and dogged commitment to the ‘lesser evil’ and sometimes ends up with bitter perplexity at the backsliding and outright betrayal that ensued.
When left electoral candidates end up compromising and collaborating, the explanation is usually sought in personal or political flaws that led to this conduct. Certainly, there are no lack of left-talking careerists and opportunists and there are entrenched political tendencies that have turned betrayal into a routine performance. However, I want to stress a few basic considerations that speak more to the inherent limits of electoral strategies under capitalism and the constraints that are imposed on reform minded governments.
1. First of all, we should understand that state power is not reducible to the government that holds office. The most radical elected government has to implement its measures through a state administration that is devoted to the capitalist order. It’s more than a question of the class loyalties of generals, police chiefs, deputy ministers and central bankers, though that’s a formidable problem. The whole state structure has developed around serving the interests of the capitalists and preserving their system and it will do this despite the best efforts of those who got elected.
2. A government that is elected on a platform of major reforms nonetheless faces the practical task of making the economy work. Though it may wish to proceed with its progressive agenda, it relies on revenues that dry up if investors pull out and the capitalists work to undermine it. As a governing power, it seeks stability and that means preserving a system of profit-making based on exploitation. This sets in motion the familiar process of pragmatic adaptation and retreat we have become so familiar with.
3. From the second point emerges a sad reality. Once the reform government plays the role of preserving profitability, it faces the dashed expectations of its working-class base. In the face of angry demands to deliver on its promises, it starts to pass back-to-work legislation and order out the cops to contain social mobilization. The well-rehearsed script of demoralizing and demobilizing those forces that could push forward an agenda of positive change plays out yet again.
4. Any major improvements for the working-class in a capitalist society, especially at a time like this, require high levels of mobilization that generate a seriously altered balance of forces in society. By definition, such exceptional levels of energy are temporary and fragile. Bold and swift action is essential and vacillating incrementalism is the kiss of death in this regard. Legislative agendas and the class struggle are highly incompatible. Portions of George Novak’s ‘Understanding History’ deal with this question of momentum at decisive moments very well.
In what I’ve just set out, we can see that a reform legislative agenda starts to take directions that are inconsistent with the kind of struggles that can achieve major changes. This is all the more so since, in the crisis-ridden conditions of global capitalism that presently exist, major reforms point to the need for a different kind of society and the overthrow of this one. The agenda of a government committed to a gradual parliamentary process comes into conflict with the forms of struggle that are essential.
From this it flows that we have to subordinate electoral strategies to the primary task of building movements. To elect representatives of these movements would be very useful. To win control of even some municipal governments would be a positive development. However, the primacy of working-class struggle and the severe limitations of electoral approaches must be understood.
We won’t be able to win major gains, let alone transform society if we place the emphasis on electing supposed agents of change. The overriding reality is that capitalism will not be defeated by the passage of a ‘Seizing the Means of Production Act’ that is debated and voted on in the House of Commons, or in the US Congress.
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