Abdul El-Sayed, Michigan's Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate, has confirmed that his sister-in-law was a plaintiff in a 2016 lawsuit challenging the federal terrorism watchlist, and says she "did nothing wrong."
The confirmation came in a Fox News interview on Saturday night, a week before Barack Obama is due to campaign with him in Detroit.
What he said
Asked by Fox News correspondent Mike Tobin whether his sister-in-law had been on the watchlist, El-Sayed answered: "Yeah."
"She did nothing wrong and was captured on that and then sued and got off," he said, and blamed the system rather than her: "You've got this system where folks are guilty until proven innocent because they've got different kinds of names," which he said existed "because of the infrastructure that people like Mike Rogers set up," a reference to his Republican opponent, the former chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
What the lawsuit was
His sister-in-law is Mariam Jukaku. In April 2016, she was one of a group of Muslim Americans, most of them from or tied to southeast Michigan, who sued in federal court in Virginia over the government's terrorism watchlist.
Their case, as Michigan Public reported at the time, was that the watchlist process was "arbitrary, secretive and unconstitutional" and swept in people with no known ties to terrorism, in one case a seven-month-old baby.
Jukaku, then a 32-year-old stay-at-home mother living in California, said she found out she had been flagged when she noticed an "SSSS" code on her boarding pass while flying home to see her parents in Michigan, and was pulled aside for enhanced screening. She complained to the Department of Homeland Security.
Three things are worth stating plainly:
- The government never confirmed she was on the list. Michigan Public reported in 2016 that she believed she had been taken off it, but that officials never confirmed she had been on it. The FBI told Fox News it does not confirm or deny anyone's watchlist status.
- Being flagged for extra airport screening is not an accusation of a crime. The lawsuit does not show wrongdoing by Jukaku or by El-Sayed, as Fox News also noted.
- "Sued and got off" is El-Sayed's summary. The litigation ended less cleanly, according to Fox News: a lower-court ruling that favoured the plaintiffs was reversed by a federal appeals court in 2021. A separate damages suit was dismissed in 2017.
The filings were first highlighted earlier this month by conservative outlets and circulated by the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
Obama in Detroit
Barack Obama will rally with El-Sayed, gubernatorial nominee Jocelyn Benson and other Michigan Democrats in Detroit on Saturday, October 24, ten days before the November 3 election. He has also taped campaign ads for Democratic Senate and governor candidates.
The race
The seat is open because Democratic Sen. Gary Peters is retiring.
El-Sayed, a physician and former Detroit health director backed by Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, won the August primary over Rep. Haley Stevens by less than one percentage point. Stevens had the support of Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer.
Mike Rogers, a former seven-term congressman, was unopposed for the Republican nomination. He narrowly lost Michigan's 2024 Senate race to Democrat Elissa Slotkin.
Polls show a close race. As of late September, Cook Political Report, Inside Elections and CBS News rated it a toss-up; Sabato's Crystal Ball and several other forecasters rated it Lean Democratic. It is one of a handful of races expected to decide control of the Senate.
What to watch
Whether the issue moves voters. El-Sayed's answer is that his family was caught up in a flawed system. Republicans have circulated the filings, and the campaign has two weeks left.
Obama's visit on October 24, and whether he addresses the issue.
New polling. Forecasters are split between toss-up and Lean Democratic.
Published Sunday, October 18, 2026. El-Sayed's comments are from a Fox News interview. Details of the 2016 lawsuit are from court records as reported by Michigan Public at the time and by Fox News. The government has never confirmed whether Mariam Jukaku was on the watchlist.
