2026年8月31日 / 美国东部时间上午9:38 / 哥伦比亚广播公司新闻（CBS News）
作者：扎克·胡达克
随着美国即将迎来2001年9月11日恐怖袭击25周年纪念日，密歇根州联邦参议员民主党候选人阿卜杜勒·赛义德可能面临新一轮审查和新一轮政治攻击的风险。
赛义德是民主党党内一批新候选人中的领军人物，该派系反对美国对外战争，并利用公众对反阿拉伯情绪的不满情绪——该州拥有庞大且活跃的穆斯林社群。但如今他正试图调整自己的立场，在某些情况下删除可能不符合广泛的大选选民群体观点的过往言论。
在即将与共和党籍众议员迈克·罗杰斯展开秋季大选竞选之际，作为前公共卫生官员的赛义德已经被迫与哈森·皮克的观点划清界限。皮克是一名人气颇高的Twitch主播，曾出席赛义德的竞选活动，他曾宣称“美国活该遭遇9·11”，之后收回了该言论并引发争议。
与此同时，赛义德过往提及这场致命袭击的内容不断被翻出，其中包括哥伦比亚广播公司新闻核实的两条此前未被报道过的已删除社交媒体帖子。在这些帖子中，他呼吁美国公众对新冠死亡人数展现出与9·11事件后同等的愤怒情绪。
其中一条发布于2020年4月的帖子中，赛义德将9·11事件中遇难的近3000名美国人与不断攀升的新冠死亡人数进行对比，并主张美国应采取与9·11事件后动员程度相称的应对措施。在另一条帖子中，赛义德写道，由于死于新冠的美国人数量超过了9·11袭击中的遇难者人数，他希望“这意味着我们将在未来十年打一场公共卫生与反贫困战争……就像我们在9·11事件后发起了全球反恐战争一样。我们本可以拯救生命，而非夺走生命。”
“阿卜杜勒始终明确谴责恐怖主义和9·11袭击事件，”赛义德竞选团队的一名发言人在给哥伦比亚广播公司新闻的声明中表示，“迈克·罗杰斯试图歪曲阿卜杜勒的信仰，这是出于恶意的谎言，目的是误导密歇根州选民。”
另一条由华盛顿自由灯塔报率先报道的已删除帖子中，赛义德在2021年9月11日写道：“今天，我悼念在纽约市遇难的3000名生命、受伤的6000人以及遭受的基础设施破坏，这些破坏是以我的信仰之名无知地实施的。明天，我将悼念在3个国家逝去的约100万生命、数百万伤者以及遭受的基础设施破坏，这些破坏是以我的国家之名无知地实施的。”
位于兰辛的两党政治顾问阿德里安·赫蒙德表示，对赛义德而言，旧社交媒体帖子的曝光可能带来独特的挑战。
“赛义德存在我所说的‘像鸭子一样嘎嘎叫的问题’，”赫蒙德说，“从大方向来看，有足够多的‘嘎嘎声’，这让很多人产生了疑问，而他在回应这些疑问方面做得并不够好。”
即将到来的9·11周年纪念将为赛义德提供另一次机会，让他以既能安抚温和派选民，又不会疏远构成其政治联盟重要组成部分的进步派活动人士的方式，应对美国历史上这段格外敏感的篇章。
“我认为人们低估了阿拉伯选民在密歇根州的重要性，”驻华盛顿的进步派战略家克里斯蒂安·拉莫斯说。
“我认为伊朗战争以及其他一切事件打乱了很多人对当下何为可接受行为的认知，”拉莫斯补充道，“而且我认为人们忽略了一点：他之所以能以那样的结果赢得初选，是有原因的——他所谈论的议题与密歇根州初选选民产生了共鸣，而他要赢得大选，就必须争取这些选民的支持。”
9·11袭击事件在很大程度上一直是美国政治团结的象征。袭击造成近3000人死亡，引发了长达二十年的军事冲突，并彻底重塑了从外交政策到机场安检等方方面面。对于寻求全州公职的候选人而言，哪怕是间接提及这次袭击，都可能招致审查，而提及其他悲剧则未必会如此。
密歇根州立大学政治学家马特·格罗斯曼表示，赛义德已删除的社交媒体帖子本身不太可能损害他的竞选活动，但它们助长了其对手所宣扬的他持有极端观点的说法。
“某一条具体的推文会对大选产生影响吗？看起来不太可能，”格罗斯曼说，“但如果普遍印象是他过于极端……这会产生影响吗？这种可能性要大得多。”
民主党战略家、哥伦比亚广播公司新闻特约撰稿人乔尔·佩恩表示，赛义德就其过往言论接受的质询越多，他就越难成功攻击对手——前共和党籍众议员迈克·罗杰斯。
“他在表达这些观点时采用了一种非传统的口吻，这让他脱颖而出，也让他展现出打破常规的意愿，”佩恩说，“现在，我认为这给他带来的问题是，人们只想讨论他这种非传统的口吻，而非他针对迈克·罗杰斯提出的经济方面的论点。”
这种态势最突出的例子出现在赛义德试图解释他与皮克的关联时。这名Twitch主播在2019年宣称“美国活该遭遇9·11”，之后收回了该言论。今年春季，当赛义德与这名主播一同竞选时，他 repeatedly 被追问两人的关系。在4月《福克斯与朋友们》的采访中，赛义德表示：“我当然不认为9·11事件是正当的。仅仅因为你和某人一同露面，并不意味着你在所有事情上都同意他们的观点。”
此后，共和党人试图将这一事件打造成对赛义德品格和判断力的更广泛考验，辩称他与皮克的持续交往反映出他的政治判断力欠佳。他的对手罗杰斯在赛义德赢得民主党提名后发表声明， falsely 将皮克的言论归咎于赛义德本人。
“我多年来一直在追捕恐怖分子，将奥萨马·本·拉登绳之以法，”罗杰斯说，“我做梦也没想到，我会与一个认为美国活该遭遇9·11的人竞争公职。”
另外，赛义德在2020年出版的《治愈政治》一书中，曾将9·11事件称为“卑劣的恐怖袭击”，并表示这些事件“令他痛心”。
更广泛地说，9·11事件议题契合了赛义德竞选团队面临的一个 recurring 挑战。在整个竞选过程中，他 repeatedly 被要求解释涉及国家安全、外交政策和极端主义的有争议的关联或言论。在每一起事件中，对手都将他描绘成脱离政治主流的人，而赛义德则辩称批评者歪曲了他的观点，或断章取义。
这种平衡行为在密歇根州可能尤其困难，该州拥有美国最大的阿拉伯裔和穆斯林社区之一。这些社区的许多选民仍深度参与关于9·11时代后果的辩论，包括伊拉克和阿富汗战争，以及针对穆斯林的监控项目。
Michigan Democrat Abdul El-Sayed’s deleted tweets on Sept. 11 attacks invite scrutiny of past remarks
August 31, 2026 / 9:38 AM EDT / CBS News
By Zak Hudak
As the nation prepares to mark 25 years since Sept. 11, 2001, Abdul El-Sayed, the Democratic nominee for U.S. Senate in Michigan, may be facing the risk of renewed scrutiny and fresh political attack.
El-Sayed is a leader of a new crop of candidates from a wing of his party that opposed American wars and capitalized on anger over anti-Arab sentiment in a state with a robust and active Muslim community. But now he is attempting to adapt — and in some cases delete — past statements that may run afoul of a broad, general election audience.
As El-Sayed heads into the fall general election campaign against Republican Rep. Mike Rogers, El-Sayed, a former public health official, has already been forced to distance himself from the views of Hasan Piker, a popular Twitch streamer who has appeared at El-Sayed’s campaign events and who generated controversy for declaring that “America deserved 9/11” before later retracting the remark.
Meanwhile, El-Sayed’s past references to the deadly attacks have continued to surface, including two deleted social media posts verified by CBS News that have not been previously reported. In those posts, he calls for the American public to muster the same outrage for the COVID-19 death toll that they displayed after 9/11.
In one, from April 2020, El-Sayed compared the nearly 3,000 Americans killed on Sept. 11 to the mounting COVID-19 death toll and argued for a response commensurate with the nation’s post-9/11 mobilization. In another, El-Sayed wrote that because more Americans had died from COVID than in the Sept. 11 attacks, he hoped “that means we’ll spend the next ten years fighting a war for public health & against poverty … like we launched a global #WaronTerror after 9/11. We could save lives rather than take them.”
“Abdul has always unequivocally condemned terrorism and the September 11 attacks,” a spokesperson for El-Sayed’s campaign said in a statement to CBS News. “Mike Rogers’ attempts to misrepresent Abdul’s beliefs are bad-faith lies meant to mislead Michiganders.”
In another deleted post, first reported by the Washington Free Beacon, El-Sayed wrote on Sept. 11, 2021: “Today, I mourn the 3K lives, 6K injuries, & infrastructural devastation in NYC, perpetuated ignorantly in the name of my faith. Tomorrow, I’ll mourn ~1M lives, millions of injuries, & infrastructural devastation in 3 countries, perpetuated ignorantly in the name of my country.”
For El-Sayed, the emergence of old social media posts could present a unique challenge, said Adrian Hemond, a bipartisan political consultant based in Lansing.
“El-Sayed has what I call a ‘Quacks like a duck problem,’” Hemond said. “There’s enough quacking going on, sort of directionally, that it has raised questions for a lot of people, and he hasn’t done a very good job addressing those questions.”
The coming anniversary will mark another chance for El-Sayed to navigate a uniquely sensitive chapter of American history in a way that reassures moderate voters without alienating the progressive activists who make up a significant part of his political coalition.
“I think that people underestimate how critically important the Arab vote is in Michigan,” said Kristian Ramos, a Washington-based progressive strategist.
“I think that the war in Iran and everything else has scrambled a lot of people’s perceptions on what is and isn’t acceptable in this moment,” Ramos added. “And I also think what people are missing is there’s a reason that he came out of the primary the way that he did: because he was speaking to issues that resonated with Michigan primary voters who he will need to win the general.”
The Sept. 11 attacks have largely served as a source of unity in American politics. The attacks killed nearly 3,000 people, launched two decades of military conflict and reshaped everything from foreign policy to airport security. For candidates seeking statewide office, even indirect references to the attacks can invite scrutiny that references to other tragedies might not.
Matt Grossmann, a political scientist at Michigan State University, said El-Sayed’s deleted social media posts are unlikely to damage his campaign on their own, but they feed a narrative pushed by his opponent that he holds fringe views.
“Is any specific tweet going to matter for the general election? It seems unlikely,” Grossmann said. “But does the general impression that he might be too extreme […] will that make a difference? That has a bigger chance of doing so.”
The more El-Sayed is questioned about his prior rhetoric, the less he will be able to wage successful attacks on his opponent, former Republican Rep. Mike Rogers, said Democratic strategist and CBS News contributor Joel Payne.
“He applies a kind of non-traditional voice to some of those ideas. That allowed him to stand out. That also allowed him to demonstrate his willingness to kind of break from convention,” said Payne. “Right now, I think what that’s created for him is that [his non-conventional voice] is what people want to talk about, as opposed to him executing an economic case against Mike Rogers.”
The most acute example of this dynamic emerged when El-Sayed sought to address his association with Piker, the Twitch personality who in 2019 declared that “America deserved 9/11” before later retracting the remark. As El-Sayed campaigned alongside the streamer this spring, he was repeatedly pressed to explain the relationship. In an interview on Fox & Friends in April, El-Sayed said: “Of course I don’t think 9/11 was justified. Just because you appear with somebody doesn’t mean you agree with them on everything.”
Republicans have since sought to turn the issue into a broader test of character and judgment, arguing that El-Sayed’s continued association with Piker reflects poorly on his political instincts. His opponent, Rogers, issued a statement after El-Sayed secured the Democratic nomination that falsely attributed Piker’s comments to El-Sayed himself.
“I spent years hunting terrorists and bringing Osama bin Laden to justice,” Rogers said. “Never in a million years did I think that I would be running against someone who believes America deserved 9/11.”
Separately, El-Sayed had called the events of September 11 “craven terrorist attacks” and said they “devastated him” in his 2020 book “Healing Politics.”
More broadly, the Sept. 11 issue fits a recurring challenge for El-Sayed’s campaign. Throughout the race, he has repeatedly been pushed to explain controversial associations or comments touching on national security, foreign policy and extremism. In each case, opponents have portrayed him as outside the political mainstream, while El-Sayed has argued that critics are misrepresenting his views or taking them out of context.
The balancing act may be especially difficult in Michigan, home to one of the nation’s largest Arab American and Muslim communities. Many voters in those communities remain deeply engaged in debates about the consequences of the post-9/11 era, including the wars with Iraq and Afghanistan, and surveillance programs that targeted Muslims.
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