Abdul El-Sayed defends calling Trump an 'unserious fool' as President says midterms 'a giant step back'

Abdul El-Sayed, the Democrat from Michigan who recently became the first Muslim to be elected to US Senate, on Sunday defended calling President Donald Trump an “unserious fool”.

The senator elect was responding to a question during an appearance on ABC's flagship weekend news programme This Week about his campaign style, having made the comments about Mr Trump the day before.

“How is it going to work, how are you going to deliver on your campaign promises when you've called him an unserious fool?", asked ABC anchor Jonathan Karl.

“Well, let's talk about how he is an unserious fool,” Mr El-Sayed responded. “Think about this war in Iran, every single president had resisted fighting before, because, of course, it was a dumb idea, because there's this place called the Strait of Hormuz, that everybody could have told you would have been a chokepoint on energy.”

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Mr El-Sayed said he felt Mr Trump's decision to essentially start a trade war with Canada, and his signing of legislation that cut taxes for the wealthiest US residents proved his point of “foolishness”.

“Let's talk about the foolishness of gutting Medicaid to pass tax cuts for the richest people in America and we're about to watch that nuclear bomb go off in the form of those cuts, taking hold in January,” he said.

Several times during the interview, Mr El-Sayed repeated his campaign slogan that many experts say propelled him to victory, “getting money out of politics and putting money in your pockets”.

Before Mr El-Sayed's ABC appearance, Mr Trump posted on Truth Social lamenting the US midterm election results, in which voters gave control of the US House of Representatives and Senate to the Democratic Party.

Show caption: US President Donald Trump continued to lament the results of…

“America took a giant step back in history with the results of the last election,” he wrote. “Even the stock market, which has been a rocketship under Trump, took a one day, three trillion dollar loss, but have no fear, we will be back.”

The first signs that the White House would double down on its pointed communication style occurred on Friday when Mr Trump announced that long-time and polarising aide Stephen Miller would be promoted to White House chief of staff following the dismissal of long-time adviser Susie Wiles.

It is in such an environment that a new US Congress will be operating, as many US residents grapple with rising prices, a lacklustre economy and an increasingly unpopular conflict with Iran.

But Mr El-Sayed shows no sign of changing his messaging that proved popular on the campaign trail.

“If he [Mr Trump] wants to continue a fool, he will hire people like Stephen Miller around the White House and he gets to choose where he goes next,” he told ABC. “The American public have made their choice.”

Democratic Representative Robert Garcia who will likely become head the of US House Oversight Committee in January, echoed those sentiments during an appearance on CNN's Sunday show, State of the Union.

“We have a job to do and we're going to do it aggressively,” he said, only days after saying Mr Miller should “lawyer up”.

“We think that he is the architect of horrific unjust policies across the country,” Mr Garcia said, referring to the controversial increase of Immigration and Customs Enforcement presence in many parts of the US, coupled with what many view as the unconstitutional and aggressive tactics of ICE agents.