Heads up, I quote a little salty language in this episode.

Right now, there's a weird thing happening for Democrats heading into November's midterm season.

This weird thing is optimism.

So, season. This weird thing is optimism. Donald Trump's approval ratings are in the gutter, and even though these congressional elections are months off, as an analyst of the New York

Times said recently, everything is breaking the Democrats way. It seems the House might go blue and flipping the Senate once a far-off dream for Democratic wishcasters. It seems possible. That means a whole lot of candidates you might not otherwise be hearing about are all over your feeds. Take the Democrats running for Senate

in Michigan. They are trying to replace a retiring member, also a Democrat, and the wide open primary

seems to be pitting a variety pack of candidates against one another. There is the moderate congresswoman,

Haley Stevens, looking for a promotion. There's an upstart state senator, Mallory McMorrow,

who's gone viral for calling out the GOP. And then there is Dr. Abdul El-Sayed. He has led

public health departments in and around Detroit. He's the guy Bernie Sanders endorsed.

And for the record, he is trying to tamp down this whole Democratic Hunger Games narrative.

I'm not racing against anybody. I'm trying to build a relationship with the people of the state of

Michigan built on 10 years of public service at this point where they know who I am and what I'm

going to fight for. Well, you're going to have to defeat a couple people to represent them, right? True, but it's not about defeating those folks. I mean, let's just be clear about it. It's not like we're like wrestling or racing. We are trying to build a relationship with the people of the state of Michigan such that those people choose to put their vote in us, right? So I'm less worried about the others and more worried

about the 10 million people in my state. But you're running in a state that elected Donald Trump

twice. Yeah. And it also voted for Biden. And then before it elected Donald Trump, it nominated

Bernie Sanders. So I just think that Michigan voters aren't like, like we're pinging back and forth

because we don't like all our alternatives.

I've spoken to one of Abdul's opponents, Mallory McMorrow, a couple of times. So I wanted

to talk to Abdul, too. A little more about him. He was a Rhodes Scholar, gave the commencement

address when he graduated from University of Michigan.

He was actually the opening act for former president Bill Clinton.

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