Michigan’s highest-ranking House Republican is crying foul on Abdul El-Sayed's claim that he is not a socialist.
"If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck," House GOP Conference Chairwoman Lisa McClain, R-Mich., told Fox News Digital. "So maybe he's not a socialist. Maybe he's a full-blown communist."
El-Sayed, a former public health official, scored an upset victory for Democrats' leftmost flank in Michigan's Senate primary earlier this month. He defeated Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich., a House lawmaker who was heavily favored by the Democratic establishment, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.
It was part of a larger wave of victories by candidates aligned with the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), several of whom have toppled sitting House Democratic lawmakers in primaries in New York and Colorado in addition to Michigan.
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And while El-Sayed himself is not a DSA member, some of the biggest names to campaign alongside him — including Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Rep. Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich. — are self-proclaimed democratic socialists.
El-Sayed told CBS News in an interview posted to YouTube last week that he was working on building a broad coalition that included supporters of President Donald Trump as well as DSA members, even though he is neither.
"Folks who come here, like, with two weeks left in the election, really, really want to label me a socialist. I don't know why, except for maybe it fits into a nice telling of a broader national story. But I'm a scientist, right? And I like solutions that solve problems," El-Sayed said. "I don't do ideology. I'd rather think of myself as a capitalist who actually read about capitalism, in the sense that the biggest risk to capitalism was always going to be corporate consolidation and monopoly, rather than government regulation."
McClain, meanwhile, argued that El-Sayed's platform is inherently socialist.
"He wants to take money out of your pockets. He wants free everything. Well, at the end of the day, if everything is free, someone has to pay for it," McClain said. "Are the farmers not gonna get paid? Are the teachers not going to get paid? He wants higher taxes, and he wants to take money out of your pockets so you can pay for your neighbors. To me, that's socialism. That's borderline communism."
El-Sayed's policy platform includes promises to fight for Medicare for all, raising taxes on millionaires and billionaires, using "wage insurance and basic income" programs to counter artificial intelligence automating industries, and abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), according to his website.
Republicans have argued that the majority of policies supported by the progressive and socialist left will amount to higher taxes for everyday Americans. But Democrats have insisted that their plans will lead to more affordable living for working- and middle-class people.
Traditionally, the party in power in the White House tends to lose seats in Congress during the midterms. That, combined with low approval numbers for President Donald Trump, means Republicans have an uphill battle to buck past political trends to keep control of the House and Senate.
But McClain pointed out that El-Sayed failed to clinch an outright majority in Michigan Democrats' Senate primary and predicted it would mean Republicans running up and down the ballot in the Wolverine State will see big gains with the far-left progressive at the top of the ticket.
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"I think it's gonna help us tremendously, right? Because if you look at El-Sayed's numbers, 50%, over 50% — the majority didn't vote for him. So what are those voters gonna do?" McClain posed. "How is El-Sayed and his crazy progressive, socialist, communist party going to bring those Democratic voters over to the Democratic side of the ticket? I don't think they are. I think those voters are going to look for a common-sense candidate, and I think those voters are either going to one, stay home or two, vote for Mike Rogers."
Mike Rogers, a former House Republican and FBI agent, is the Republican nominee in Michigan.
He made an appeal to Democrats days after the matchup became official, stating in a video, "If you're among the majority of Democratic voters that woke up on Wednesday feeling, well, hopeless, because the person who won does not represent your values, well, just know, there is still hope."
Fox News Digital reached out to El-Sayed's campaign for comment.