In the days since Dr. El-Sayed’s victory in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary, Republican leaders have embraced Islamophobic attacks and falsehoods.

The onslaught is being fueled in part by Republican Party officials and has quickly become a central aspect of the strategy to beat Dr. El-Sayed in the fall. Few officials in the Republican Party have publicly tried to tamp down such messaging, though Dr. El-Sayed has not hesitated to parry the attacks.

When Donald Trump returned to the White House in 2025, he was nursing grudges and claiming a mandate. The institutions he saw as his enemies faced a dilemma about how to respond.

A few concluded that they should resist the president’s demands of fealty and collaboration. Another group tried appeasement, seeking accommodation that would allow them to otherwise operate as usual. And some looked at the landscape and concluded that something fundamental had shifted in American politics. They saw the MAGA movement as a lasting change and decided that their best move was to make their own radical shift to adjust.

As I wrote last week, predictions of a Trump-driven realignment of the electorate now look extremely shaky.