MS NOW is hard at it, ramping things up for the crazy homestretch to the midterm elections. This is the season of flooded television campaigns, push polling, and selective candidate profiles, so the recently rechristened news network is diligently participating. This is an audacious or desperate bid (pick one) on behalf of one party.
On Morning Joe, we were presented with a feature concerning an election focus group. In introducing this segment, anchor Mika Brzezenski described this as involving “Michigan voters,” but it is quickly shown this was something else entirely.
Elise Jordan went to Michigan to sit down specifically with Democrat voters, but with a clear purpose. It was an entirely targeted outreach, where these were Black voters from Wayne County, and Jewish voters from Oakland County. And even more specifically, these were Democrats who voted against Abdul El-Sayed in the primary.
The intent was clear, just from this setup; the goal was to try to find a way to convince these reticent voters to cast their selection next month for the controversial Democrat. Jordan even said as much in her introduction:
We spoke to….two groups of democratic voters here who supported Congressman Haley Stevens in the Senate primary…and heard what they still need to hear from their party’s nominee.
Nothing like some bold electioneering from MS NOW, one month from the midterms!
In one of the Jewish voting groups, one man announced that he is conflicted because he is a stalwart Jew. His issue is that he has a 30-year-old daughter who is transgender, and he believes that the Republican has a platform to attack trans individuals: “A vote for Mike Rogers is a vote for my daughter being oppressed.” (Way to go, Mike; your unstated trans aggression has cost you support from this microscopic demographic!)
As the people expressed their hesitations towards El-Sayed, we have Elise Jordan working on behalf of the candidate. “What would take you over the finish line? What would change your opinion between now and election day?”
I mean, seriously; rather than being a journalist, she sounds more ardent than a volunteer campaign staffer out doing door-knocking for El-Sayed. “What is holding you back, though, about him?!”
Damn, just calm down, Elise. It almost feels like they framed the camera angle to hide her “El-Sayed ’26” shirt and campaign button. And then, she kept pressing.
“You’re committed Democrats,” she said, with a bemused smile. “All of you. You want to vote for the Democratic candidate – but you just can’t. What can he do, if anything, to get you over the edge?”
Then, back in the MS NOW studio, after this clip, Jordan addressed the Morning Joe panel, and she sounded like a DNC field rep:
Now, I think the Wayne County Democrats, I think they will come along. And I think that President Obama coming and campaigning with Abdul El-Sayed is going to be huge. And I do think at the end of the day, that group of voters, they’re still persuadable and they just need to be introduced.
This underscores the entire purpose of this focus group effort. MS NOW is looking for a way to get those Democratic voters in line. It is a brazen effort by this network to work on behalf of a candidate in such a blatant fashion.
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
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