Abdul El-Sayed and Melat Kiros secure firsts in US midterms

Candidates with African roots win across levels of government

The 2026 US midterm elections, held halfway through a president’s four-year term on 3 November, included Abdul El-Sayed’s election to the Senate in Michigan and Melat Kiros’s election to Congress from Colorado’s 1st District, BBC News reported. The contests decided who would represent Americans in Congress and in thousands of state and local offices.

BBC News reported that Abdul Rahman Mohammed El-Sayed, 42, is set to become the first Muslim US senator when Vice-President JD Vance swears him into office in January as Michigan’s new senator. Born in the US to Egyptian immigrant parents, the Democrat thanked supporters at his victory rally and playfully addressed Vance, who had campaigned against him. “My name is Abdul Rahman Mohammed El-Sayed,” he said in an Egyptian Arabic accent to the cheering crowd.

During the campaign, President Donald Trump accused El-Sayed of supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, an allegation El-Sayed rejected. BBC News also reported that conservative media and Trump targeted El-Sayed during the campaign, while his Arabic Muslim name was a target for many opponents.

El-Sayed built a social-media-first campaign around TikTok edits that showed him speaking directly to young voters, Gen Z humor and friendship bracelets. His progressive agenda included Medicare for All, affordable housing and curbing corporate influence in politics. He also criticized US military aid to Israel.

BBC News reported that Melat Kiros, 29, became the first Gen Z woman elected to the US Congress. Born in Ethiopia, Kiros arrived in the US as a baby and grew up in Denver. She had never held elected office before defeating a 15-term incumbent in the Colorado 1st District Democratic primary and then winning a landslide in the 3 November election.

Kiros campaigned on the cost of living, universal childcare and Medicare for All. Endorsed by the Democratic Socialists of America, she also called for abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement and ending US military aid to Israel. Her criticism of Israel’s war in Gaza drew controversy, and she said her criticism was directed at the Israeli state, not Jewish people.

BBC News also reported that Kiros was fired in 2023 from a top New York law firm after she refused to take down an open letter to dozens of law firms urging law school deans to crack down on antisemitism on campuses as students engaged in pro-Palestinian protests. Kiros condemned antisemitism but warned the firms not to conflate “such bigotry with the geo-political question of Israel’s legitimacy.” She said the firing led her to think more seriously about politics in general.

Adrian Boafo, 32, will represent Maryland’s 5th Congressional District after winning the seat vacated by veteran Congressman Steny Hoyer, who retired after a political career spanning more than four decades. The second-generation Ghanaian-American was born in Virginia and raised in Prince George’s County, Maryland. His parents immigrated from Ghana. Boafo served on the Bowie City Council, became a Maryland state delegate in 2023 and worked for Hoyer before winning the race.

Boafo’s campaign focused on the cost of living, childcare and protecting federal workers, particularly in a district close to Washington DC and home to thousands of government employees. In his victory statement, Boafo said representing his constituents had “never felt more urgent”, pointing to federal job cuts, rising costs and the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown.

Ilhan Omar, 44, won a fifth term in Congress despite an ongoing federal investigation. Federal agents searched her Washington home in October as part of the inquiry into her immigration paperwork; Omar has denied wrongdoing and has not been charged with a crime. First elected in 2018, the Somali-born lawmaker became the first Somali-American and one of the first Muslim women to serve in Congress. Trump has repeatedly criticized her and other Somali immigrants.

Trump has previously used derogatory language to describe some African countries, including Somalia. In October, his Yemeni-born adviser Amer Ghalib said the president would refrain from using such language.

Junior Ezeonu, born in Nigeria and moved to the US as a young child, had become Grand Prairie’s youngest city council member by 27 before winning a seat in the Texas State House. Carol Kazeem, 34, is a Pennsylvania state legislator of Nigerian heritage who retained her District 159 seat. At least four candidates with Nigerian heritage won in the 3 November midterms.

For young Africans watching from across the Atlantic, the US victories offered a glimpse of what a new generation of voters could achieve at home, BBC News said. Social-media users in Nigeria and Kenya shared the election results as a source of inspiration, particularly because major elections are due in 2027.