Abdul El-Sayed disavows Muslim Brotherhood and criticizes implications that he has ‘dual loyalty’

Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed on Saturday disavowed the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist political movement, during a heated exchange at a town hall.

El-Sayed, who could make history as the first Muslim elected to the Senate, has frequently faced Republican accusations that he is sympathetic to interests connected to Islamic terror. In recent days, Republicans including his GOP challenger, Mike Rogers, and President Donald Trump have commented about potential connections to the organization.

An attendee at a town hall in Caro, Michigan, repeatedly pressed El-Sayed about the Muslim Brotherhood, saying he had yet to hear the candidate reject the organization.

“Abdul, will you disavow the Muslim Brotherhood?” the man shouted from the crowd.

El-Sayed, after disavowing the movement, blasted the man for implicitly assuming his “dual loyalty.”

“You assume … that because I am Muslim, that somehow I would have some allegiance to something that is not our Constitution,” El-Sayed said. He later added, “For me, that Constitution is the guiding light.”

The audience member walked out after the exchange as the crowd cheered for El-Sayed.

The nominee has faced questions about potential connections to the organization. The latest attacks came after old tweets from El-Sayed’s half-sister resurfaced online, including a post from 2012 in which she described having “an amazing talk with my mom about her activism in the Muslim Brotherhood during the early 70s while she was in college.”

Earlier this week, El-Sayed denied allegations that he or his family has ties with the Muslim Brotherhood, telling reporters that to think that anybody in his family was part of the organization was “an insane thing to assume.”

El-Sayed has said he does not know what his mother was doing in Egypt during the 1970s, explaining he was 3 when his parents divorced and didn’t see his mother for years after being raised by his father and stepmother.

“They want to talk about me or point to my mom or my sister,” El-Sayed said on Thursday, adding, “I’m running for office. Judge me by my actions and my work.”

The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamist movement with global offshoots that once wielded significant political power in Egypt, where it was founded. The movement officially rejects the use of violent means to secure its goals. However, offshoots of the group have been linked to attacks in the past.

Trump signed an executive order in November that initiated a process by which certain chapters or other subdivisions of the Muslim Brotherhood could be considered for designation as Foreign Terrorist Organizations.

El-Sayed has suggested that questions about supposed ties to the Muslim Brotherhood are rooted in bigotry.

“To insinuate that somehow, because of my Muslim faith, as somebody who might be the first senator who has that faith, that I would have anything but allegiance to the Constitution, that should be called into question,” El-Sayed said Sunday on MSNOW.

CNN’s Gloria Pazmino contributed to this report.

密歇根州民主党参议员候选人阿卜杜勒·埃尔-赛义德周六在市政厅会议上与人激烈争论，期间他公开谴责了伊斯兰政治运动穆斯林兄弟会。

埃尔-赛义德有望成为历史上首位当选参议员的穆斯林，但他经常面临共和党人的指责，称他同情与伊斯兰恐怖主义有关的利益集团。近日，包括他的共和党挑战者迈克·罗杰斯和唐纳德·特朗普总统在内的多位共和党人都对埃尔-赛义德与该组织的潜在联系发表了评论。

在密歇根州卡罗市的一次市政厅会议上，一位与会者反复向埃尔-赛义德追问有关穆斯林兄弟会的问题，称他还没有听到这位候选人公开反对该组织。

“阿卜杜勒，你愿意与穆斯林兄弟会断绝关系吗？”人群中有人喊道。

埃尔-赛义德在公开否认该运动后，抨击该男子暗中假定他“效忠双重国家”。

“你们认为……因为我是穆斯林，所以我就会效忠于宪法之外的东西，”埃尔-赛义德说道。他随后补充道，“对我而言，宪法就是指路明灯。”

交流结束后，一名观众离场，人群则为埃尔-赛义德欢呼。

这位被提名人面临着与该组织潜在联系的质疑。最近的攻击发生在埃尔-赛义德同父异母的妹妹早年发布的一些推文在网上重新出现之后，其中包括一条2012年的帖子，她在帖子中描述了“与母亲进行了一次意义非凡的谈话，谈到了她在70年代初上大学期间参与穆斯林兄弟会的活动”。

本周早些时候，埃尔-赛义德否认了他或他的家人与穆斯林兄弟会有联系的指控，他告诉记者，认为他的家人中有任何人是该组织的一员是“一种疯狂的假设”。

埃尔-赛义德表示，他不知道他的母亲在 20 世纪 70 年代在埃及做什么，他解释说，他的父母在他 3 岁时离婚，之后他由父亲和继母抚养长大，多年未见母亲。

“他们想谈论我，或者拿我妈妈或我姐姐说事，”埃尔-赛义德周四说道，“我正在竞选公职。请根据我的行动和工作来评判我。”

穆斯林兄弟会是一个伊斯兰主义运动，在全球各地拥有分支机构，曾一度在其发源地埃及拥有强大的政治影响力。该运动官方否认使用暴力手段实现其目标。然而，该组织的多个分支机构过去曾与一些袭击事件有关。

特朗普于 11 月签署了一项行政命令，启动了一项程序，根据该程序，穆斯林兄弟会的某些分会或其他分支机构可能会被考虑指定为外国恐怖组织。

埃尔-赛义德认为，有关与穆斯林兄弟会有联系的质疑源于偏见。

“有人暗示，因为我信奉伊斯兰教，作为可能是第一位拥有这种信仰的参议员，我就会对宪法不忠诚，这种说法应该受到质疑，”埃尔-赛义德周日在MSNOW上说道。

CNN的格洛丽亚·帕兹米诺对本报道亦有贡献。