Smith warns Piker association could become general-election liability for Democrats

Stephen A. Smith, the ESPN personality with a long record of political commentary, sat down with POLITICO host Dasha Burns this week to voice a concern that has been quietly circulating among Democratic strategists: the growing political footprint of Hasan Piker, a far-left streamer with millions of followers, could become a serious problem for the party in general elections. Smith's worry is not about Piker's influence within the progressive base—it's about what happens when that association travels beyond it. "It's going to contaminate the electorate on the left side of the aisle," Smith said. "It's going to come back to haunt them."

The concern is no longer theoretical. In Michigan, where one of the country's most closely watched Senate races is unfolding, Piker's relationship with Democratic nominee Abdul El-Sayed has already become a flashpoint. El-Sayed has resisted calls to distance himself from the streamer, who has endorsed him and appeared at multiple campaign events. The Republican National Committee has seized on this, with national press secretary Natalie Baldassarre releasing a statement in August that attacked El-Sayed as a "terrorist sympathizer" and an "America-hating socialist" for his refusal to break with Piker. The RNC framed the association as evidence of a broader Democratic problem—either the party shares Piker's ideology, Baldassarre suggested, or it lacks the spine to confront him.

El-Sayed has offered a different rationale for his strategy. When Smith pressed him directly on why he hasn't disavowed Piker, El-Sayed explained that he sees value in reaching the roughly three million people who listen to the streamer. His calculation is that by appearing alongside Piker and engaging with his audience, he can offer those voters a pathway into electoral politics—a way to channel their political energy into campaigns rather than leaving them outside the system entirely. "I want to offer them a pathway into an electoral movement," El-Sayed told Smith, "where, rather than sit outside of the electoral system, they see a pathway around the things that they agree with that he says that I agree with, and a pathway that disavows the things that I disagree with."

Smith understood the logic: El-Sayed wasn't endorsing Piker personally but rather trying to convert his audience into voters. "So you're not thinking about him. You're thinking about the three million people that support him, and you're trying to get those votes," Smith said. El-Sayed confirmed this was exactly his thinking.

The political math in Michigan suggests the strategy is being tested under real pressure. A recent Fox News poll of registered voters showed Republican nominee Mike Rogers leading El-Sayed 51 percent to 47 percent, a margin within the sampling error but still a deficit. The polling also revealed a stark divide: while 98 percent of Democratic Socialists of America supporters backed El-Sayed, his support dropped to 69 percent among non-DSA Democrats and independents. That gap—nearly 30 points—illustrates precisely what Smith and others worry about: the Piker association may energize the left while alienating the broader electorate that Democrats need to win a general election.

Piker himself has been a recurring source of controversy. In 2019, he declared that "America deserved 9/11," a statement he later retracted. More recently, he has faced backlash over comments about American Jews and Israel. Fox News Digital reported that El-Sayed's campaign attempted to create distance between itself and Piker after these controversies surfaced, even as the streamer continued to campaign for him. The timing underscores the tension at the heart of El-Sayed's gamble: the very audience he is trying to reach may come with baggage that weighs down his candidacy among swing voters and moderates who will decide the general election.

Smith's warning reflects a calculation that is becoming harder for Democrats to ignore. The party's progressive wing has grown more visible and more vocal, and figures like Piker command real attention and real audiences. But that visibility comes with a cost in general elections, where the electorate is broader and less ideologically aligned. Republicans have already shown they intend to weaponize these associations, turning individual candidate decisions into a referendum on the entire party's direction. Whether El-Sayed's strategy of engagement rather than disavowal can overcome that political headwind remains an open question—and one that will likely shape how other Democratic candidates approach similar situations in the months ahead.