DETROIT, MICHIGAN — Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed headlined an Islamic conference over Labor Day weekend where the United States was described as an empire in decline, early Islamic conquests were praised and the aftermath of 9/11 was framed around Islamophobia and discrimination. The event, held annually by the Islamic Society of North America, featured a range of speakers discussing topics from Muslim civic participation to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas. Over the course of the conference’s speeches and panel discussions, participants took positions that were generally critical of the United States and the broader Western world and expressed opinions that some may regard as extreme.
Fox News Digital attended the event over the weekend, sitting in on many of the panels held on Saturday and Sunday before and after El-Sayed's speech. The Michigan Democrat is running in one of the most hotly contested Senate races of the 2026 cycle, the outcome of which may decide control of the Senate. At one panel dubbed "Rising Islamophobia in the U.S.," a speaker described recently passed legislation that could bar colleges participating in certain commercial boycotts of Israel from receiving some federal higher-education funds as "an anti-Muslim bill." EXILED MUSLIM SCHOLAR WARNS FAR-LEFT–ISLAMIST ALLIANCE BEHIND ANTI-ISRAEL PROTESTS ECHOES IRAN’S RISE Shortly after that, a man in the audience wearing a Pakistani flag pin stood up and called for a fatwa to be issued against the bipartisan group of lawmakers who voted for the bil.
A fatwa is a religious ruling or opinion that can range from a formal condemnation to, in some cases, a call for or justification of violence. The legislation was introduced by Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., and co-sponsored by Rep.
After the man called for a fatwa against members of Congress, members of the audience — and one panelist — applauded. Earlier during the same discussion, a panelist criticized Congress for moving to censure Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib for making "the most lighthearted comments" Tlaib was censured in part for endorsing the phrase "from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free" — which calls for the destruction of Israel as bounded by the Jordan River in the east and the Mediterranean Sea in the west.
Critics characterized the phrase as a call for ethnic cleansing while the congresswoman defended it as "an aspirational call for freedom, human rights and peaceful coexistence." ISNA is a nonprofit Muslim religious organization established in 1981 to provide America's growing Muslim population with a platform for civic coordination and education. Detroit, where the event took place, is situated in a metropolitan area that has a significant Arab American population concentrated in areas such as Dearborn and Hamtramck. EL-SAYED CAMPAIGN BACKED BY OVER $100,000 FROM DOZENS OF MEMBERS OF GROUP WITH ALLEGED TERROR TIES Panelists also accused billionaire Elon Musk of funding a white supremacist global anti-Muslim movement, suggested that some of the narrative regarding 9/11 taught in American schools has been "debunked," and asserted that Muslims were treated unfairly in the wake of the 2001 attacks.
Criticism of America’s response to 9/11 surfaced repeatedly across the conference’s events and breakout sessions. One speaker asserted that one of the most important things to reflect on as the 25th anniversary of 9/11 approaches is that "Islamophobia is at an all-time high." Another called the War on Terror, a series of post-9/11 military operations that claimed the lives of over 7,000 U.S. military personnel, the "War of Terror." El-Sayed has sought to moderate his public image since launching his Senate campaign, even as he has maintained ties to prominent socialists and socialist-aligned activists. His attendance at the recent ISNA conference is the latest in a series of associations that have drawn criticism, including ties to Nation of Islam figures, Muslim clerics accused of expressing support for terrorist organizations and activists on the socialist left.
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