El-Sayed Leads Michigan Senate Race by 66,921 Votes, Crypto Stakes in Play

Abdul El-Sayed pulled ahead in Michigan's Senate race, leading Mike Rogers by 66,921 votes at 05:07 CET. He sits at 51.3 percent against Rogers' 46.8 percent with 30.0 percent of the expected vote counted, according to NBC News and AP data. No winner has been called. Roughly 3,436,000 votes are still outstanding, mostly in Wayne, Macomb and Oakland counties, and county reporting arrives unevenly, so the gap can still stretch or shrink.

The ballot-type split favors El-Sayed in mail voting, 63 to 35 percent, and in early in-person voting, 58 to 41. Rogers only turns it around on Election Day votes, 52 to 46. Wayne County, home to Detroit, has shifted from D+29.0 in the 2024 presidential race to D+52.8 with just 6 percent counted, while Kent County near Grand Rapids moved from D+5.4 to D+35.0 with 36 percent in. Across larger areas where at least half the count is in, the margin has drifted 1.6 points toward Democrats — though those numbers compare a partial Senate count against a full presidential one, so the final swing can go either way.

The stakes are big. Michigan is the only open Democratic-held Senate seat in a state Trump carried in 2024, and Republicans have not won a Senate race there since 1994. Spending has topped $243 million, making it the priciest election in state history. The seat opened up because Democrat Gary Peters opted against a third term. El-Sayed, a former Wayne County health director, took the August 4 primary with 48.5 percent after a close fight with Representative Haley Stevens, while Rogers, a former congressman, was the lone candidate on his party's primary ballot. In the governor's race, Democrat Jocelyn Benson leads Republican John James 53.3 to 45.1 percent with 30 percent counted.

Neither candidate is running against crypto. Stand With Crypto gives Rogers an A rating and a score of 99, calling him a strong supporter, and hands El-Sayed a B and a score of 74. Rogers has called the GENIUS Act a major victory that is not the final one, while El-Sayed told the group he backs legislation clarifying SEC and CFTC oversight plus a stablecoin framework. The cash is lopsided: Tech Influence Watch logs $810,700 for Rogers from the crypto committee First Principles Digital and nothing from crypto PACs for El-Sayed, who drew $77,550 in direct support from Ripple Labs, Microsoft, Google and one other company or their executives. Fairshake and its affiliates show up only in Michigan House races.

The state's money is already in the market. The State of Michigan Retirement System told the SEC on October 27 that it held 300,000 shares of the ARK 21Shares Bitcoin ETF worth $8.31 million, 37,418 shares of the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust ETF worth $2.42 million, and 460,000 shares of the Grayscale Ethereum Staking ETF worth $9.86 million as of September 30. That totals about $20.6 million out of $22.6 billion in reported holdings, or 0.09 percent, and the share counts have not changed since June. Michigan's Bitcoin reserve bill, HB 4087, still has not been voted on — its last step was a move to another House committee on March 19, 2026.