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00:00Enjoy this free edition of off script, a straight arrow
00:03subscriber exclusive. Hey everybody, I'm Christian
00:09Bryant. Welcome to unbiased updates off script. We spend
00:12all week reporting the news. Now we get to talk about
00:16it coming up on the podcast. A candidate for the U.S.
00:19Senate has a pretty unusual way of handling tough
00:22questions. He fires back with questions of his own is
00:26Abdul El Said calling out unfair attacks or is he just dodging
00:30the questions? I'll ask our senior politics reporter. Why are
00:34you asking me that come out and just say the thing that you're
00:37implying? It is fascinating. It is making people who support
00:42him like him even more. Plus AI needs a lot of power and we
00:47mean a lot so much that tech companies are now building power
00:51plants to run their data centers. But our energy reporter
00:55found some of those plants are getting approved with little
00:57public input and the communities are pushing back and
01:01Ukraine says it just pulled off the first in warfare using
01:05a flying drone to rescue a wounded soldier from the front
01:08lines. We'll tell you how they did it. Let's start with
01:13what matters, what caught our attention this week and why
01:16we think it deserves yours. There's a Democratic Senate
01:19candidate in Michigan who's getting a lot of attention, not
01:23just for what he says, but how he answers questions. Take a
01:26listen to what happened when someone at a town hall
01:28campaign stop asked Abdul El Sayed to denounce the Muslim
01:32Brotherhood. Now, the person who asked the question is off
01:34mic, so it's a bit difficult to hear. But what's more
01:37interesting is El Sayed's response. Take a listen.
01:46What's your name? What's your name? No, what's your name? No,
01:49what's your name? No, no, no, what's your name? No, your
01:51friend's got the mic. I'm asking you a simple question. You
01:54give me your name. I'll answer the question. Hi, Tommy. How
01:57are you? Are you? Do you know what the Constitution of the
02:00United States is? I have one question. Will you disavow the
02:04group? Sure. Yeah, absolutely. But I want to I want to ask
02:07the question that you're asking. Why are you asking the
02:09question? Well, because they're a terrorist group. Okay. No, no,
02:14but what are you implying? Do you assume that I wouldn't? Yes.
02:18Why not? Because I have not heard you disavow them yet. Have
02:21you disavowed them? I haven't heard you disavow them yet. I
02:23disavow them. Do you? Great. Now, he did eventually say yes, he
02:27does denounce the group, but not before turning the tables and
02:31asking nearly three dozen questions of his own. And this
02:34isn't the first time he's done it. Here's another example on
02:37Fox News when asked about his support for gender affirming
02:41care. So you think it's okay for a parent to slash his
02:45thing? You think that's okay? I mean, do you? So do you really
02:51want to have this conversation? Are you circumcised? Yeah, yeah.
02:54But I mean, that's a personal question. Okay, doctor, you
02:58probably should want to move on. I probably should want to move
03:00on. And circumcision is different than castration. I think
03:04it's a problem. It's a problem that you think that you get to
03:08decide what happens between a parent, a doctor and a patient.
03:12And I'm just saying that, yes, circumcision is surgery on a
03:15kid's ding-a-ling. So if you really want to bring that up, you
03:17can. I just think you guys are really selective about how you
03:19want to talk about these things. That's wacky.
03:20So is El-Sayed challenging the premise of unfair questions or
03:24just getting really good at not answering them? Ozzy, thanks again for
03:29joining us on off script. I had a chance to read your article. I
03:35really enjoy your reporting as something I've already told you
03:40time and time again. Oh, thank you. Yeah. Well, you know, you can
03:44cash at me later. Tell me a little bit about Abdul El-Sayed and how he's
03:51handling some tough questions on the campaign trail. I'm curious to know how
03:56his approach compares to what we've seen from other candidates.
04:02So elections are a popularity contest. You have to convince people
04:05to vote for you as opposed to somebody else. And many people use
04:10that as the opportunity to say, be nice, be welcoming. Even if you
04:16don't like something, try to turn the other cheek and like show a bit of
04:22grace, even when something is not working out your way, right? Voters
04:25don't want to see people like often being antagonistic when there's
04:30a good faith question being asked of them, right? That isn't quite
04:35happening here. Now, Abdul El-Sayed is a physician, public, he
04:42worked in public health in the Detroit area. And if elected, he would be
04:45the first Muslim elected in the U.S. Senate. Because of this historic
04:49nature of his candidacy, and because he is an outspoken critic of the U.S.
04:55support of the government of Israel, there has been a lot of questions
05:00thrown at him that he, by his nature, seems to think are illegitimate. So,
05:06rather than answering the question that he gets asked, he takes it as an
05:12opportunity to question the person posing him the question and basically
05:17saying, why are you asking me that? Come out and just say the thing that
05:21you're implying. It is fascinating. It is making people who support him like
05:27him even more. And it is also challenging people who are asking him questions
05:33about his stance on Israel, his stance on terrorist groups and things like
05:37that. He's making them come out and say what it is that's behind their
05:42question. And it's not something that we're seeing a lot of on the campaign
05:45trail. Is this an effective strategy? I don't know how we would measure it, but
05:52is this something that, you know, that people have responded positively to?
05:57Because, you know, this, his campaign has kind of been a machine of, you know,
06:03viral moments. Very online. And a lot of them, right, extremely online.
06:08Using a lot of language of the internet. The language of the internet. An NPC or like a NPC,
06:15like non-player character or something like that. It's the kind of like stuff that you heard coming
06:20out of 4chan and through Republican politics. And he's one of the few Democrats that uses that kind
06:24of language. And the demeanor he has, you know, he's sort of like a former football high school
06:32player. He still works out. He's like buff and he's cutting like a different profile of the kind
06:38of candidates that Democrats have normally run. And he's cutting against a lot of the caricatures
06:43that Republicans try to argue is from is a Democratic candidate. So like, is it working
06:51in the room? It sounds like it is.
06:53He gets clicks online. If your campaign makes a video of your own candidate and it doesn't sort
07:00of do well online, then like you really have some problems. But it's getting people's attention
07:07because it shows a fight. But it also shows like something substantive. Most recently,
07:13there was this exchange where he's at like a town hall event and literally as he's turning away,
07:19like you see it on the screen, he's turning away. He's like walking on the stage somewhere.
07:22And you hear a voice yell out. In fact, the thing that most
07:29consultants will say is if there's something negative and you're explaining it, you're losing.
07:35Like you hear that all the time from communication consultants. If you're explaining, you're losing.
07:39Al-Sayed is leaning into the explanation, except he makes himself the one asking. And he's saying,
07:46why are you asking me that question? Have you asked other people that question? I haven't heard
07:51you denounce them. This is something I want to encourage our viewers and our listeners to go
07:59back and watch if they haven't seen it already. Because it has become something that we've seen
08:06more than once while he's been on the campaign trail. And this kind of leads into the other portion,
08:15not just how he has been answering questions with questions, but how religion has become
08:20a big part of the conversation around his candidacy? Talk to us a little bit about that. How has religion
08:28really shaped the conversation around his candidacy?
08:32It's an issue that he gets asked about directly and indirectly. And for a candidate running in a
08:42competitive Senate seat in Michigan, you know, a swing state, it's a battleground state, it's elected
08:50Democrats and Republicans. So when he gets asked a question about his own personal identity,
08:58he often, later in the campaign season, he often sort of shrinks that answer and says,
09:06the thing that's really important is the price of groceries. My last name is not the reason why
09:10your grocery bill is high. My first name is not the reason why you can't see a doctor. My middle
09:18name
09:18is not the reason why your tax bill is going up. Like he makes this connection, not excusing in any
09:27way
09:27who he is and apologizing for it. But he's saying like, if you're worried about those kitchen table
09:32issues, that question is not going to answer it. It's sort of immaterial. But what has been very clear
09:40in 2026 is that Republicans have sought to gain attention by framing a threat coming out of the
09:55Muslim community that they say needs to be addressed. They use the word Sharia law as a stand in for
10:01some kind of imposition of Islamic rule that the country needs to be protected from.
10:09It's not happening. It's very much a dog whistle. And we can follow that line, that conversation
10:16all the way to the end. And we sort of know where it goes. What El-Sayed is trying to
10:22do,
10:24and it's a challenge, I think, that a lot of historic candidates face, you know, the first black
10:28president, you know, the first woman running for a particular office. Now we have a Muslim,
10:34a person who is Muslim, who happens to be Muslim, that is running for Senate.
10:39There's the question of like the weight of history. Are you facing questions that other
10:43people wouldn't face because of your identity? And what he has tried to do is acknowledge the
10:50identity and historic nature, but keep the focus on the issue that he thinks are going to cut his way
10:57rather than his opponents. Mike Rogers, former FBI agent, has raised the issue of terrorism,
11:03has raised his background in fighting terrorism. And that's been seen as a very subtle way of saying,
11:08I am the anti-terrorism guy, you know. And Abdul El-Sayed's critics have said
11:21the emphasis and the focus that Mike Rogers is putting on that issue is a way of othering
11:25a person who looks like Abdul El-Sayed, who was born in the US, his parents are immigrants from Egypt,
11:33and they've even called into question his, you know, all sorts of manner of his American nature.
11:38Yeah, his identity has become a talking point where he wants his politics to be front and center.
11:51Before we, before I let you go, Ozzy, you know, I'd be remiss not to mention the fact that former
11:59President Barack Obama will be campaigning with El-Sayed very soon.
12:06There's a clip of El-Sayed talking about his relationship to former President Obama and
12:13likening him to a parent that, let's say, you don't really disagree with, but you love anyway.
12:21That you do disagree with, but you love anyway.
12:23Right, that you do disagree with, but you love anyway.
12:26Yeah.
12:26I mean, what do you, what do you make of his criticisms while also, you know,
12:30still tapping into the president's ability to galvanize voters?
12:36It is something that appears to be necessary. Barack Obama is still, by and large, more popular
12:43than he is unpopular, especially with black voters, who is a constituency that Abdul El-Sayed
12:50appears not to have made as many inroads as you would think a Democrat would traditionally.
12:55And that could be crucial. Abdul El-Sayed's criticisms of, you know, Israeli Prime Minister
13:04Benjamin Netanyahu and the Israeli campaign in Gaza and the West Bank has helped fuel
13:13criticism of him from Jewish voters who appear to be open to voting for a Republican in the past where
13:20they may not have been. So that cleaving of like that block of voters or some set of that voters
13:27makes it even more important to hold on to other constituencies in, in a Democratic, you know, winning
13:34faction and bringing the first and so far only black president to campaign with you when you need to
13:43sort of shore up members of that community. It seems like a smart move, although he has been on the
13:50record
13:50criticizing Obama's two terms by essentially saying he didn't go far enough. It wasn't really a
13:56directional argument. Like progress is always something that you have to exceed previous expectations.
14:04And it is hard to galvanize progressive voters if the person you're now praising and standing next
14:10to is someone that they view as having fallen short. But, you know, in the final days of an election,
14:17anyone that you think you can help you out, you're going to find a way to be friends with them
14:21and
14:21invite them over and see if you can make it into the end zone. Is that the right sports analogy?
14:27That was that was incredible. I will say if I was campaigning right now, I would be making a call
14:33to
14:33senior politics reporter Ozzy Pabra to come show face for for my campaign. Ozzy, as always,
14:44thank you for the time and your reporting. And I look forward to catching up with you again soon as
14:51we
14:51get closer and closer to the midterm. So thanks so much for being on off script. Thanks for having me.
15:02The comment section can be a pretty loud place. So every day we pick a question or comment worth
15:08a closer look and see where the facts take us. We got a couple of comments about our report Tuesday
15:14about the U.S. Holding up Patriot missiles for Ukraine. Ashton Black on YouTube says, stop giving
15:20them our weapons. Mac McElveen wrote, pay for your own war. Does the American voter want gas down
15:27or not? So why does America send weapons to Ukraine anyway? First, national security. The argument is
15:34that stopping Russia and Ukraine could prevent a much bigger conflict in Europe, one that might
15:39eventually involve American troops. Second, who pays? The U.S. has provided billions in military aid,
15:47but under a newer NATO program, European allies are also paying for American weapons sent to Ukraine.
15:53And third, there's a trade off. Those weapons cost money and take time to replace. America needs them
15:59too. So the debate isn't just whether we should help Ukraine. It's whether helping now reduces the risk of
16:06a much bigger war later. We love hearing from you. So keep those comments coming into us here at
16:13Straight Arrow. You can leave them on our YouTube page or email us at offscript at san.com.
16:25Okay, now let's go inside the story. Each week we grab one of our reporters and go a little deeper.
16:30We
16:31discuss what didn't make the story, the questions that came up and what they found while reporting it.
16:35We all know AI is booming, but here's something you might not know. Some of the data centers powering
16:42it are now getting their own power plants, and that's raising questions about pollution,
16:47oversight, and how much say the people living nearby actually get. Our energy reporter Keaton Peters dug
16:54into the permits and found a growing number of projects using a less rigorous approval process.
16:59He also met a Texas family that put construction of their dream home on hold after learning a massive
17:05data center and power plant could be built across the street. So how is all of this happening and
17:10who's keeping an eye on it? That's the end of the free version of off script. If you want to
17:16hear
17:16the full episode, become a straight arrow subscriber at san.com slash get off script and get access to every
17:23episode.
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