Abdul El-Sayed

El-Sayed was born in the metro Detroit area to parents who emigrated to the United States from Egypt.[8]

He grew up in the Detroit area with his father Mohamed El-Sayed and stepmother Jacqueline El-Sayed, a native of Gratiot County, Michigan. Both are engineers. His father grew up in Alexandria, Egypt, and emigrated to the United States to study engineering at Wayne State University.[9] His mother, Fatten Elkomy, is a nurse practitioner in Missouri.

El-Sayed graduated in 2003 from Bloomfield Hills Andover High School, where he was a three-sport athlete—wrestling, football, and lacrosse—and a captain in the latter two.[9] El-Sayed attended the University of Michigan, where he majored in biology and political science, and played on the men's club lacrosse team.[10] He won the William Jennings Bryan Prize for Political Science, graduated with Highest Distinction, and delivered the student commencement speech in front of president Bill Clinton, who delivered the 2007 commencement address.[11]

El-Sayed was awarded a full-tuition scholarship to attend the University of Michigan Medical School, where he completed his first two years of medical school.[12] There he led a student medical mission to Peru and founded a student organization that raised money and coordinated community service for a local free clinic.[13] As a second-year medical student, he declined a Marshall Scholarship and accepted a Rhodes Scholarship to attend Oriel College, Oxford,[14] where he completed a PhD in public health in 2011.[15] While at Oxford, he earned a full blue as captain of Oxford's men's lacrosse team.[16] In 2014, he completed his MD at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and was funded by the Soros Fellowship for New Americans[17] and Medical Scientist Training Program.[18] El-Sayed did not pursue a residency after medical school and is therefore not licensed to practice medicine.[19]

El-Sayed is the author of over 100 scholarly articles, abstracts, and book chapters on public health policy, social epidemiology, and health disparities.[20] His essays on public health policy have also been published in The New York Times,[21] CNN,[22] The Hill,[23] The Huffington Post,[24] The Detroit News,[25] and the Detroit Free Press.[26]

On February 9, 2017, the Detroit News reported that El-Sayed would resign as health director to run for governor of Michigan in the 2018 Democratic Party primary.[4] He officially announced his candidacy on February 25, 2017.[9] El-Sayed was inspired to run for governor following the Flint water crisis, saying: "I watched as Governor Snyder and his team of accountants were cutting costs and cutting corners. Their inattention to communities ultimately poisoned thousands of children - and those children were the very ones that I was serving at the helm of the health department. ... And that's something I didn't believe in. I believe in government as something we do in this country for the people and by the people".[30]

El-Sayed pledged not to accept any campaign donations from corporations, and raised over $5 million from individual donations.[41]

El-Sayed was endorsed by U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders,[42] Democratic congressional nominee and democratic socialist activist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,[43] and 2017 Women's March organizer Linda Sarsour.[44] He was also endorsed by the organization Justice Democrats[45] and The Nation magazine.[46] In the August 7 primary, he received 340,560 votes, or about 30% of the vote, thus losing to Gretchen Whitmer.[47]

In September 2018, El-Sayed launched a political action committee, Southpaw MI PAC, to support liberal down-ballot candidates and take positions on ballot initiatives.[48]

El-Sayed lives in Ann Arbor with his wife, Sarah Jukaku, a psychiatrist.

• Official website
• Appearances on C-SPAN