Barack Obama and 'Abolish ICE' Abdul El-Sayed discussed midterm strategy in 'encouraging' phone call: report

Democrat Michigan Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed discussed his race and campaign in an "encouraging" phone call with former President Barack Obama, according to a report from The Detroit News. El-Sayed, who won by about 20,000 votes in a primary against moderate Democrat Rep. Haley Stevens, spoke to Obama on Friday, which the outlet described as "encouraging."

The idea behind the call was to find ways to unite Democrats in the state ahead of the general election come November. El-Sayed claims to represent the working class but that demographic went to his opponent while he secured wealthy, educated voters.

“Sometimes, you really should meet your heroes," El-Sayed said of the discussions with Obama. The two discussed working together to unite Democrats his candidacy. The Senate candidate referenced Obama's political rise while he was on the campaign trails, saying, "I've got to be honest with you: It was the first time I ever saw myself reflected in politics at all." El-Sayed backs abolishing immigration and customs enforcement in the United States.

Obama won Michigan in both 2008 and 2012 and could be a big help for El-Sayed's bid to become the next Senator from Michigan despite some of the controversy surrounding the candidate.

In March, leaked audio revealed that El-Sayed did not want to talk about the death of Iranian regime leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed by US and Israeli forces. He claimed "there are a lot of people in Dearborn who [were] sad" over Khamenei's death. Dearborn is a Muslim stronghold in Michigan.

In discussions about how he would handle questions on the Iranian leaders death, El-Sayed said "go straight to pedophilia, frankly."

"I'll just be like, 'Pedophile president decides that he doesn't like the front page news, so he decides to take us into another war,'" El-Sayed said. The Senate candidate has also said that he wants to "abolish ICE" and that there should be "Medicare for all."

El-Sayed has also embraced far-left streamer Hasan Piker, who has previously said that America "deserved 9/11" and said of landlords that socialists should "kill those motherf*ckers." El-Sayed, when he was asked about Piker's comments on 9/11, said that it was a "dumb statement," but did not say he would stop campaigning with Piker.