Rogers releases new advertisement knocking el Sayed for comments about football being racist

A guy in a Michigan shirt talking about his dad coaching football at Redford Union is not exactly hardball politics, but it works precisely because it's simple. Mike Rogers isn't inventing a controversy here. Abdul el Sayed actually said the things he's being quoted on, and Rogers is just holding them up next to a photo of himself in pads. That's the whole ad. Sometimes the most effective message is just repeating what your opponent said out loud.

The instinct in some quarters will be to roll eyes at this as small-ball culture war stuff, unserious next to inflation or the border. But football in Michigan isn't a prop, it's a civic institution. Friday nights, Big House Saturdays, dads who coached at schools most people outside the state have never heard of. When a candidate for Senate suggests the sport itself is some kind of racial problem, that's not a gaffe you get to have forgotten by the general election. Voters remember who talked down to the things they love.

El Sayed's campaign will probably call this a distraction from real issues. Maybe. But there's something telling about a Democratic candidate whose comments keep giving his opponent free ammunition. Rogers didn't need to twist anything. He just held up a mirror, and it's not his fault if what shows up in it looks bad.