Swing-state poll spells trouble for far left as Schumer-backed candidate dominates with critical voting blocs

Moderate Democratic Rep. Haley Stevens holds a seven-point lead over far-left rival Abdul El-Sayed, and leads big with working-class and Black voters, in a crucial political fight not only for the Democratic Senate nomination in battleground Michigan but potentially for the fate of the party, according to new polling.

Stevens, who is backed by longtime Senate Democratic Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer and the party establishment, stands at 48% support among Democrats likely to vote in the Aug. 4 primary, with El-Sayed, a former Wayne County Health Department director endorsed by progressive champions Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, at 41%.

The Detroit News/WDIV poll, conducted by Glengariff Group, indicated roughly 10% of respondents remained undecided with the primary just three weeks out.

In the wake of attention-grabbing victories by socialist and far-left candidates in blue congressional districts in New York City and Colorado in recent weeks, the primary in Michigan is viewed as the biggest battle to date between the left-wing and the center-left establishment for the future of the Democratic Party.

The poll indicates Stevens with a large 22-point lead among non-college-educated voters, while El-Sayed holds a seven-point advantage among those with college degrees.

El-Sayed is up by 12 points among White voters, while Stevens holds a massive 46-point advantage among Black voters in the survey, which had a margin of error of 4.4 percentage points.

The primary showdown has become combustible and expensive, with outside groups spending big bucks to flood the campaign trail with ads.

The biggest spending is United Democracy Project, a political action committee aligned with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). The group reports spending nearly $15 million in support of Stevens and against El-Sayed.

"Haley is leading in this race because the stakes of this election could not be higher," Sam Barrett, campaign manager on the Stevens campaign, told Fox News Digital in a statement in reaction to the poll.

"When Democrats win in November, we'll keep Mike Rogers out of the Senate, and stop Donald Trump from having free rein to appoint Supreme Court justices who will ban abortion, cut health care, and strip away workers' rights. Michigan needs a Senator who is ready on day one to fight and has won tough races before. That's Haley, and that's why her message of lowering costs, protecting manufacturing, and taking on Trump's corruption and abuses of power is resonating across the state."

El-Sayed, who, if elected, would make history as the nation's first Muslim senator, is an epidemiologist who unsuccessfully ran for governor as an insurgent candidate in 2018. He has made support for Medicare for all a major component of his campaign.

The far-left candidate has also called for abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and is a vocal critic of Israel amid its war with Hamas — even characterizing Israel's actions in Gaza as "genocide" against Palestinians. And El-Sayed, who served as a top surrogate on Sanders' 2020 presidential campaign, has vowed not to accept PAC donations.