It is not often that I write critically of a Republican United States senator. But that happened in February 2023, when Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville placed a hold on military promotions to protest a Department of Defense policy that covered travel expenses for service members seeking reproductive healthcare across state lines. Tuberville's hold ultimately delayed the promotions of more than 400 senior military officers, many of whom were colonels or Navy captains awaiting promotion to general or flag rank, for roughly 10 months.
The "Tuberville Blockade" upended the lives and careers of hundreds of Army, Air Force and Marine Corps colonels and Navy captains by seriously disrupting carefully planned career paths and assignments. It also disrupted the carefully constructed career paths of the generals and admirals who were sidelined by the ill-considered embargo.
Career military officers ought never again to be held hostage for political goals. Sen. Tuberville eventually relented after months of mounting pressure from senators in both parties. He lifted his blanket "hold" after long meetings with his Senate colleagues, who emphasized to him that he was damaging the careers of people who had provided exemplary service over decades.
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Sen. Tuberville is almost certainly going to be the next governor of Alabama, and hopefully he will be a better governor for having learned from his mistake. But the precedent he set in 2023 should alert everyone to why a radical leftist like Michigan’s Abdul El-Sayed ought never to hold the office of United States senator.
El-Sayed is a sworn enemy of the State of Israel, and I fear that it is very unlikely that he will be a supporter of the American military. El-Sayed has also repeatedly appeared with controversial left-wing streamer Hasan Piker, including at campaign rallies. His staunch allegiance to Piker telegraphs exactly what he could do if he beats Republican Mike Rogers in the fall: wreak havoc on our military and Israel’s defenses. El-Sayed has already called for a complete embargo on weapons sales to Israel — even defensive weapons.
El-Sayed supports "the immediate and comprehensive enforcement of U.S. laws that condition the provision of military aid and sales." He argues this means "an immediate arms embargo on Israel," and El-Sayed specifically rejects the distinction between offensive and defensive weapons, meaning his position includes weapons such as Iron Dome interceptors, not merely offensive bombs and missiles.
This stance places him among the most outspoken Senate candidates opposing U.S. military support for Israel. As a true hater of Israel, would El-Sayed dust off the Tuberville playbook to try to bring aid to Israel to an end? There is no reason voters should assume he would hesitate to do so. There’s a precedent, and it is easy to hear a Sen. El-Sayed arguing that he is just deploying the same tactic that a Republican senator used.
The question for Michigan voters is not whether one senator could single-handedly shut off every American weapon or dollar flowing to Israel. He could not. But Senator Tuberville’s 2023 blockade demonstrated how much disruption a determined senator can cause by exploiting the Senate’s rules and customary procedures to delay action and force political confrontations.
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It is difficult to imagine El-Sayed losing sleep over the damage he would impose on the U.S. military. That’s the possibility Michigan voters have to consider when they cast ballots this fall.
There are a few pro-defense Democrats left, including Michigan’s own Elissa Slotkin. But just as GOP senators would not publicly criticize their colleague in 2023, the handful of Democrats who are serious about national security would likely adhere to the unwritten code of the Senate that prohibits public attacks on colleagues from their own party conference.
So the Michigan Senate race is the most important election in the country this year. The Republican volunteers willing to go to the battleground state and campaign for Rogers will be participating in a cause much bigger than themselves.
They will be protecting the country’s national security. El-Sayed isn’t simply an extremist. He’s a dangerous radical who should not be in a position to harm the country’s armed forces.
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Hugh Hewitt is a Fox News contributor and host of "The Hugh Hewitt Show" heard weekday afternoons from 3 PM to 6 PM ET on the Salem Radio Network, and simulcast on Salem News Channel. Hugh drives Americans home on the East Coast and to lunch on the West Coast on over 400 affiliates nationwide, and on all the streaming platforms where SNC can be seen. He is a frequent guest on the Fox News Channel’s news roundtable, hosted by Bret Baier weekdays at 6pm ET. A son of Ohio and a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School, Hewitt has been a Professor of Law at Chapman University’s Fowler School of Law since 1996 where he teaches Constitutional Law. Hewitt launched his eponymous radio show from Los Angeles in 1990. Hewitt has frequently appeared on every major national news television network, hosted television shows for PBS and MSNBC, written for every major American paper, has authored a dozen books and moderated a score of Republican candidate debates, most recently the November 2023 Republican presidential debate in Miami and four Republican presidential debates in the 2015-16 cycle. Hewitt focuses his radio show and his column on the Constitution, national security, American politics and the Cleveland Browns and Guardians. Hewitt has interviewed tens of thousands of guests from Democrats Hillary Clinton and John Kerry to Republican Presidents George W. Bush and Donald Trump over his 40 years in broadcasting. This column previews the lead story that will drive his radio/ TV show today.
