Reports confirmed this week that Michigan’s Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed has expressed support for and has familial ties to the Muslim Brotherhood terrorist organization, and also has family members who have worked for organizations that have provided monetary support to Hamas and al-Qaeda. The revelations are raising alarm over the potential threat to national security that El-Sayed could pose as an elected senator.

As reported by The Washington Free Beacon, El Sayed’s half sister Eman Abdelhadi posted tweets during the 2012 accession of Muslim Brotherhood ally Mohamed Morsi to the Egyptian presidency describing her family’s ties to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, which has been classified as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist group by the U.S. government for its material support of Hamas. Abdelhadi, an assistant professor at the University of Chicago who has since celebrated the October 7 anniversary of the atrocity on Israel carried out by Hamas, noted that her family in Egypt “has long been MB” and that she is “Praying for all my family that supports the #MB in Egypt. Lie low, stay safe.”

Nevertheless, during an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press” over the weekend, El-Sayed repeatedly denied that either he or his family had any ties to the terrorist organization.

The claim is particularly notable in light of an open letter that El-Sayed himself signed in 2012, which declared support for Morsi and called for the new regime to “purge the media and police.”

As catalogued by the National Review editorial board, El-Sayed’s familial ties to terrorist groups extend even further. His mother Fatten Elkomy worked for the Islamic American Relief Agency, which was accused of supporting Hamas and al-Qaeda in 2004 by the U.S. Treasury Department. A court filing documented Elkomy’s “participation in wire transfers and recorded phone calls between 1999 and 2002, as well as an IARA-USA transfer request form for over $24,000 to its Iraq office.”

In addition, El-Sayed’s father-in-law Tayeb Jukaku, who is a “prolific contributor to a pro-El-Sayed super PAC,” served on the Islamic Society of North America’s (ISNA) founding committee for almost two decades. In 2007, federal prosecutors cited ISNA “as an unindicted co-conspirator” in the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development’s clandestine operation that funneled $12 million to Hamas. Jukaku also formerly served as president of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Michigan chapter, which was also named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land case.

The views that El-Sayed has expressed toward terrorist sponsoring states like Iran are also raising eyebrows. In recent days, he has doubled down on equating Israel with Iran, insisting that Israel is just as much of a “threat” to the U.S. as Iran is and declaring there were “a lot of people in Dearborn who are sad” after the Iranian dictator Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is responsible for the deaths of an estimated 700 American servicemembers and tens of thousands of Iranian citizens, was killed by U.S. forces.

The National Review editorial board observed that as a sitting senator, “El-Sayed could serve on committees that would give him access to sensitive national security information. Given his litany of troubling associations, his family ties to radical Islamist organizations, and his own statements, he should not be put in a position that requires such trust.”

Experts like Lt. Col. (Ret.) Robert Maginnis, who serves as Family Research Council’s senior fellow for National Security, are also expressing reservations about El-Sayed’s reported terrorist ties.

“These reports raise serious questions that deserve direct answers before voters entrust Abdul El-Sayed with the responsibilities of a United States senator,” he told The Washington Stand. “However, family relationships alone do not establish that someone poses a national security threat. The proper examination concerns his own conduct, associations, judgment, and candor.”

Maginnis continued, “The reported 2012 statement supporting Mohamed Morsi and calling for a purge of Egypt’s media and police deserves particular scrutiny. If El-Sayed signed that statement, he should explain what he intended, whether he repudiates it today, and how that position squares with the constitutional freedoms he would swear to defend.”

“As a retired Army officer,” he added, “I take the protection of sensitive national security information seriously. A senator’s decisions can affect intelligence sources, military operations, and American lives. Credible evidence of foreign influence, extremist commitments, or concealed relationships would warrant examination regardless of the individual’s party or religion. I would not conclude from the allegations presented that El-Sayed would compromise classified information. That conclusion requires evidence concerning him personally. But voters should insist on a full accounting of the reported statement and any relevant relationships with organizations implicated in supporting terrorism.”

“Religious liberty protects every American’s right to practice his faith and seek public office,” Maginnis concluded. “It also leaves every candidate accountable for his record. El-Sayed deserves a fair examination, and Michigan voters deserve substantive answers.”