A former Michigan public health official and Democratic candidate for governor entered the race for the state’s open U.S. Senate seat on Thursday in what could be one of the most watched races in the 2026 midterm elections.

Abdul El-Sayed, 40, is the second Democrat to put his name in the running to replace Democratic Sen. Gary Peters, who is not seeking reelection. 

El-Sayed, a prominent figure in a movement that was highly critical of support for Israel in the 2024 election cycle, aims to set himself apart from the other Democratic candidates in the race to replace Peters, state Sen. Mallory McMorrow. 

McMorrow has said she would vote against Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., retaining his leadership position should she prevail in the primary and general election to represent the battleground state in the upper chamber of Congress. 

However, El-Sayed held back criticism of Schumer.

«Anybody who tells you that they’re going to unilaterally oppose one potential candidate without knowing who the alternative is, is either unnuanced or unsophisticated,» El-Sayed told Politico. «So I want to know who is available, who is actively seeking the leadership. I’ll make a decision from there.»

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«What we need right now is somebody who’s willing to take the fight directly to Trump and Musk, but then also knows how to rebuild a version of our federal government that better serves working people after the carnage that Musk and Trump are going to leave behind, and I think I offer that,» he told Politico. 

Other Democrats considering a run to replace Peters include U.S. Rep. Haley Stevens and Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel.

El-Sayed was active in the «uncommited movement,» a group of anti-Israel, traditionally Democratic voters in Michigan, a critical swing state, who threatened to withhold support from then-President Joe Biden, and then then-Vice President Kamala Harris, over the administration’s stance on Gaza. He did say he would back whoever was the eventual Democratic choice for the presidential ticket to oppose now-President Donald Trump, according to Politico.

The Israel-Hamas war exposed deep divisions within the Democratic Party last election cycle, and there is concern the conflict could again make for a messy Senate Democratic primary in Michigan if the American Israel Public Affairs Committee intervenes. The powerful pro-Israel lobby group financially backed Stevens in 2022, when redistricting forced a competitive primary run against fellow Democrat, Rep. Andy Levin.

«Everybody is unified around leadership that reminds the Democratic Party that we ought to be the party of peace and justice, that we ought not to be the party sending bombs and money to foreign militaries to drop bombs on other people’s kids in their schools and their hospitals, when our kids need more, our hospitals and schools need more, and we should be spending that money here at home,» El-Sayed  told Politico. 

Abdul El-Sayed speaks during a coronavirus public health roundtable with presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday, March 9, 2020. (Erin Kirkland/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

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El-Sayed ran for governor in 2018 as a progressive Democrat and was endorsed by Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y. 

He came in second in the Democratic primary, losing to Gretchen Whitmer by more than 20 points and beating now-U.S. Rep. Shri Thanedar by more than 12 points. Whitmer went on to win the general election and is in the midst of a second term. She cannot run again because of term limits.

A resident of Ann Arbor, El-Sayed recently served as director of the Department of Health, Human and Veterans Services in Wayne County, home to Detroit. Before that, he was the public health director of the city after it declared bankruptcy in 2013.

El-Sayed cautioned Democrats against learning the «wrong lessons» from their defeats. 

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders participates in a coronavirus public health roundtable with healthcare professionals, including Abdul El-Sayed, left, as he campaigns on March 9, 2020, in Detroit. (Scott Olson/Getty Images)

«If you cut corners and trim your message, and you triangulate to the least common denominator, you can find something that’s perfectly inoffensive to everyone, and the problem with that is that you’re not actually saying anything,» he told Politico. 

El-Sayed said he met with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee on Tuesday. He told Politico that it was his «understanding» that the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm would not get involved in the primary. If that happens, that deviates from how the DSCC previously acted to clear the field of potential primary candidates to make for an easier primary victory for then-Rep. Elissa Slotkin. Now-Sen. Slotkin, D-Mich., easily won the primary over Hill Harper, and then won the general election.

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El-Sayed is also the second candidate this week to launch a campaign to replace Peters. On the Republican side, former U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers launched his bid on Monday after losing the Senate race last year by 19,000 votes to Democrat Slotkin.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Authorities at the Philip S.W. Goldson International Airport (P.G.I.A.) say they were alerted to a U.S. man who was hijacking a small plane in Belize on Thursday.

The man stabbed two passengers and a pilot, before one of the stabbed passengers fatally shot him, according to officials in Belize and the United States. The passenger was licensed to carry a firearm and later turned his weapon over to the police.

«We are praying for him,» Chester Williams, Belize police commissioner, told reporters. «He’s our hero.»

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Williams identified the hijacker as Akinyela Taylor and said he was a U.S. military veteran, a report by The Associated Press said. U.S. officials could not confirm the Belize police commissioner’s statement that Taylor was a military veteran.

The air flight Cessna Caravan V3HIG from Corozal to San Pedro had 14 passengers and 2 crew members onboard, the statement from P.G.I.A. said.

A full emergency was declared immediately after the incident started and the aircraft circled in random directions for approximately two hours until finally landing safely at the P.G.I.A., according to a statement by the Belize Airport Concession Company.

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Tourists queue at the Tropic Air counter at Philip S.W. Goldson International Airport in Belize City on April 17, 2025.  (JOSE A. SANCHEZ/AFP via Getty Images)

U.S. State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said at a news briefing in Washington that officials were still gathering information about what occurred.

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«Horrifying,» she said. «We are grateful, I think all of us are, that it did not turn into a mass casualty event with, I believe, over a dozen people on the plane. Clearly we know a few details. We don’t know much more.»

U.S. officials said they did not know the motive for Taylor’s hijacking but were working with Belizean authorities to determine what happened.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

Los gobiernos de Ucrania y Estados Unidos firmaron el jueves un Memorando de Intención que establece el marco preliminar para un Acuerdo de Asociación Económica y la creación de un fondo de inversión destinado a la reconstrucción de Ucrania, según anunció la viceprimera ministra ucraniana y ministra de Economía, Yulia Svyrydenko, a través de la red social X.

“Esperamos que el Fondo se convierta en una herramienta eficaz para atraer inversiones en la reconstrucción de nuestro país, la modernización de la infraestructura, el apoyo a los negocios y la creación de nuevas oportunidades económicas”, escribió Svyrydenko.

La funcionaria aseguró que el documento firmado refleja también el interés del pueblo estadounidense en “invertir junto al pueblo ucraniano en una Ucrania libre, soberana y segura”.

Svyrydenko precisó que el memorando es fruto de una reciente ronda de conversaciones técnicas celebradas en Washington entre equipos negociadores de ambos países. Explicó que el próximo paso será concluir la redacción del Acuerdo de Asociación Económica, firmarlo formalmente y someterlo a la ratificación de los parlamentos de Estados Unidos y Ucrania.

Mientras tanto, los equipos siguen avanzando en los trabajos preparatorios. “Hay mucho por hacer, pero el ritmo actual y el progreso significativo dan razones para esperar que el documento sea muy beneficioso para ambos países”, declaró Svyrydenko.

El memorando también contempla futuras iniciativas de cooperación en materia de recursos minerales estratégicos, una cuestión que fue abordada el mismo jueves en Washington por el presidente estadounidense Donald Trump, durante una reunión con la primera ministra italiana, Giorgia Meloni. Desde el Despacho Oval, Trump indicó: “Tenemos un acuerdo sobre minerales, que entiendo que se va a firmar el jueves -24 de abril-”.

No obstante, el secretario del Tesoro estadounidense, Scott Bessent, señaló que “aún se están ultimando los detalles” del acuerdo y sugirió que la firma podría producirse “alrededor del 25 de abril”.

En paralelo, el presidente ucraniano Volodimir Zelensky indicó que ambos países podrían suscribir de forma telemática el memorando de intenciones el 24 de abril, lo que sugiere que el documento firmado hoy constituye un paso intermedio hacia ese objetivo.

El gobierno de Ucrania calificó el jueves como “constructivo” y “positivo” el encuentro bilateral sostenido en París entre representantes del presidente Volodimir Zelensky y una delegación de Estados Unidos encabezada por el secretario de Estado Marco Rubio, con el objetivo de avanzar hacia un cese del fuego y un acuerdo de paz duradero con Rusia, según un comunicado difundido por la Presidencia ucraniana.

De acuerdo con el documento, las delegaciones discutieron sobre los esfuerzos necesarios para alcanzar un alto el fuego completo, así como el establecimiento de una paz “amplia, justa y duradera”. Ambas partes acordaron mantener un canal de diálogo abierto y periódico para continuar las conversaciones sobre estos temas.

A la reunión asistieron también los enviados presidenciales especiales de Washington, Steve Witkoff y Keith Kellogg, quienes más tarde participaron en una reunión multilateral junto a representantes de Francia, Alemania y el Reino Unido.

El presidente francés Emmanuel Macron calificó el diálogo realizado en el Palacio del Elíseo con los mismos términos: “positivo” y “constructivo”. En declaraciones a los medios, anunció que las conversaciones proseguirán la próxima semana en Londres, y señaló: “Todos estamos claramente unidos en nuestro deseo de paz”. A través de sus redes sociales, Macron expresó también su respaldo a la iniciativa del presidente estadounidense Donald Trump para lograr un fin al conflicto “lo antes posible”.

Durante el encuentro, la delegación ucraniana subrayó la relevancia de los asuntos humanitarios como condición para avanzar en el proceso de paz, entre ellos el retorno de los niños ucranianos deportados a Rusia, y la liberación de prisioneros de guerra y rehenes civiles, que calificaron como elementos indispensables para generar confianza entre las partes.

(Con información de EFE, AFP y EP)