US Vice President JD Vance has criticised Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, branding him a "limousine socialist" after his primary win, and warned that Democratic socialist policies would damage the state's automotive industry and lower wages for American workers. The remarks came during an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham, in which Vance argued that El-Sayed's economic platform posed a direct threat to blue-collar jobs in Michigan, a state central to the US car manufacturing sector.

Vance's comments form part of a broader Republican effort to cast progressive Democratic candidates as out of touch with working-class voters ahead of the midterm elections. El-Sayed, who has positioned himself on the party's left flank, has faced separate scrutiny over party unity and his associations, with the article noting wider debate about how the press might frame such controversies in coverage of Michigan's Senate race.