Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., criticized New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Michigan Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed over their views on Israel Thursday, calling their positions "wrong" and saying they did not reflect congressional Democrats.

The two progressive Democrats were mentioned by "On Brand" podcast host Donny Deutsch, who asked Pelosi how he, as a Jewish man, could reconcile his support for the Democratic Party with politicians whose statements he considered antisemitic.

"When you say Israel doesn't have the right to be a Jewish state, that's antisemitic as far as I'm concerned with all that," Deutsch said.

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When Pelosi asked for examples, Deutsch named Mamdani and El-Sayed, calling their comments "concerning."

"No, it's more than concerning," Pelosi responded. "It's wrong. It's wrong. And it isn't a reflection of the Democrats in the Congress of the United States. This new person in Michigan, we'll see if he gets elected to the Congress. But the mayor, bless his heart, I hope he succeeds as mayor, but I don't agree with some of the things he has said. But in terms of our people in the House of Representatives, if somebody says that, the other members disassociate themselves from it."

Before he was elected New York City mayor, Mamdani repeatedly dodged questions when asked if Israel should be a Jewish state. In a June 28 interview with ABC News, however, Mamdani said he supported Israel as a state with equal rights but declined to endorse it as a Jewish state. 

"I think any state that privileges one religion over the other is one that I can’t tell you I support, whether it be Israel or Saudi Arabia or anywhere else," Mamdani said.

El-Sayed has repeatedly declined to affirm whether Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state. In a May appearance with Jewish supporters, the candidate said he "struggled" to answer this question and suggested the idea of a Jewish state wasn't consistent with the liberal values "we say we believe in here in the United States."

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Earlier in the interview with Deutsch, Pelosi initially denied that anyone in the Democratic Party was antisemitic.

"The fact is that I really do not know of anybody there on our side who is engaged in antisemitism. That may be what it appears to be or what they're charged to be. But if they are, it's only a few. If there are, I think sometimes they say things that they shouldn't and can be interpreted that way," Pelosi said.

Despite her concerns about Mamdani and El-Sayed's comments, she dismissed their impact on the party as a whole.

"People represent their districts, and we have to respect that. The job description, job title is representative, but that doesn't mean it has an impact on the consensus of the Democratic Party, and [House Minority Leader] Hakeem Jeffries has been very clear on that," Pelosi said.

Fox News Digital reached out to representatives for Pelosi, Mamdani and El-Sayed for comment but did not immediately receive a response. 

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Rabbi Yaakov Menken, executive vice president of the Coalition for Jewish Values, acknowledged Pelosi "as one of the Jewish community's best friends among House Democrats" but said it was alarming that she did not seem to recognize antisemitism among her colleagues.

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"Pelosi claims she wants for those voices to be marginalized within her party, yet she demonstrates that she has turned a deaf ear, both to antisemitic expression from her colleagues and to the rabbis anxious to set her straight on the magnitude of the problem. If she is indeed one of our best friends, should we not be scared by that?" Menken told Fox News Digital.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, suggested that Americans could die if Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed is elected, suggesting that the Democrat could use U.S. intelligence to tip off terrorists.

"If Abdul El-Sayed becomes the senator from Michigan, there is absolutely nothing to stop Chuck Schumer from placing Abdul El-Sayed on the Senate Intelligence Committee. The Senate Intelligence Committee has access to our most closely-guarded secrets. And if I am correct that he is a passionate supporter of the Muslim Brotherhood, there is a very real risk that Americans will die as a result," Cruz warned.

"We have American service men and women in harm's way fighting Muslim Brotherhood terrorists right now. And we also have intelligence covert operatives heroically going undercover trying to anticipate and stop terror attacks before they happen, before they kill Americans. We have every reason to believe that Abdul El-Sayed, if he found out, 'OK, they're about to apprehend these terrorists,' that he would let those terrorists know," Cruz claimed.

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The El-Sayed and Rogers campaigns did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital's comment requests on Thursday.

Speaking to Fox News chief political anchor Bret Baier last week, the Democratic candidate said that he has "never been" and "never will be a member of the Muslim Brotherhood."

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"I am interested in serving the United States. I'm interested in swearing an oath to the Constitution that every senator has swore an oath to," El-Sayed said.

El-Sayed is facing President Donald Trump-backed former Rep. Mike Rogers in the Michigan U.S. Senate contest.

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Cruz made the comments while campaigning for Rogers in the Wolverine State on Wednesday.

The fiance of Rep. Haley Stevens, D-Mich. has come out and said he cannot vote for Democratic Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed, believing he is an antisemite.

Stevens, though, remains undaunted, backing the candidate for Senate. Jason Turkish, a Jewish registered Democrat, told The Detroit News he will be voting for Republican Senate nominee Mike Rogers, appearing at a Rogers event sponsored by the Republican Jewish Coalition on Wednesday night at the Townsend Hotel in Birmingham, Michigan.

"I waited, and I watched and I listened for Abdul to moderate – but he didn't moderate, he escalated," Turkish, a Michigan lawyer himself, told reporters on the sidelines of that event in a video published by The Detroit News.

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"He's gotten worse, and worse and worse as this general election campaign has gone on. Rather than bringing people together, he's just driven them further and further apart."

Despite Turkish's concerns, Stevens has not backed down from her support for the Democrat who defeated her in a closely fought primary this summer.

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"Like a lot of households across America, we're a house divided," Stevens told CNN.

"I still very much want our Democratic nominee, his name is Abdul, to win this race," she said. "There's so much on the line."

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Turkish says El-Sayed's anti-Israel rhetoric makes his community "less safe," fearing his party will bend to radicals claiming that there is a "genocide" in Gaza.

"When he says genocide over and over again, when he refuses to condemn an ad that says Jews are to blame for the price of bananas, he makes my community less safe," Turkish said. "He makes a lot of communities less safe."

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El-Sayed is a longtime critic of Israel, calling the war in Gaza a "genocide." Israel argues that it is fighting terrorists that are using Gaza civilians as human shields, taking efforts to avoid civilian casualties, such as notifying people and telling them to evacuate buildings before conducting strikes.

"Every time he talks about genocide, Jews get death threats," Turkish added. "We have never seen a candidate for U.S. Senate act so recklessly toward the safety of Jews in the community as we have seen from Abdul."

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Turkish rebuked the candidate's ties to California streamer Hasan Piker, and El-Sayed's refusal to distance himself from someone he had said America deserved 9/11.

"I watch him in recent weeks as he has become verbally combative with any reporter who has the gall, as he sees it, the gall to ask him about Hasan," Turkish said.

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"Everything we hear from Abdul El-Sayed includes equivocation, and it includes equivocations to try to explain away hate, and there is no explaining away hate. And I predict to you that Michigan will reject this."

Turkish, a Democratic donor who has also given to some Republicans, described his decision as "putting country before party."

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"This is not someone we can let into the United States Senate," Rogers said of El-Sayed at his Wednesday night campaign event, making no mention of Turkish's vote in his stump remarks. "If you don't know Iran is our enemy and you can't condemn a Hezbollah-inspired attack, you have no business being in the United States Senate."

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Turkish is the second major figure from Stevens’ orbit to back Rogers in recent days. Her former campaign chair, attorney David Kramer, said Tuesday he also plans to vote for Rogers. Stevens endorsed El-Sayed after the primary but has not campaigned or appeared with him publicly since a unity breakfast shortly afterward.

Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed said Wednesday the U.S. needs to work "diplomatically" to combat Mexican cartels and blamed American guns for their rise.

Appearing on "The Moment Podcast," El-Sayed was asked by co-hosts Jorge Ramos and Paola Ramos about the Trump administration's efforts to fight Mexican cartels since the beginning of President Donald Trump's second term in 2025. 

When asked whether he would support using troops or drones, El-Sayed rejected the idea and suggested that the U.S. bears some responsibility for their rise.

"Let's be clear, American-manufactured guns are responsible for a lot of the cartels," El-Sayed said.

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He emphasized the need to be "working diplomatically" to address the flow of drugs and guns across the border and "contain" what he referred to as "cartel behavior" involving U.S. guns.

"We need to be working with Mexican counterparts to support them in an effort to contain cartels," El-Sayed said. "Containing cartels doesn't mean that we go and do war-like actions south of the border. It means working alongside them to ask what is the flow of guns that might be turned into cartel behavior down the stretch.

"How do we address our side of things?" he continued. "And how do we get serious about the complex system that is cartel behavior, and how do we stop the flow of fentanyl coming northward?"

El-Sayed's campaign reiterated his position to Fox News Digital, saying, "Abdul was referring to working with the Mexican government to crack down on the cartels to prevent the flow of guns and illegal drugs across the border."

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Fox News Digital reached out to the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment but did not immediately receive a response. 

Although El-Sayed criticized the lack of control over drugs or guns crossing the border, he previously called for abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

El-Sayed's comments came a month after the Trump administration, through the Treasury Department, sanctioned 21 individuals and 25 entities linked to Los Mayos, a faction of the Sinaloa Cartel.

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"Today’s action underscores that no cartel kingpin, corrupt Mexican government official or financial facilitator is beyond the reach of Treasury’s authorities," Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent told Fox News Digital at the time. 

"Our message is clear: The Trump administration will identify and disrupt any cartel actor who threatens our security or the integrity of our financial system."

Actor Mandy Patinkin has posted several videos on social media, including one on Friday, urging Jewish voters to support Michigan Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed if they're concerned about their "safety" in the country.

"Jewish safety depends on a real multiracial democracy, and Abdul is the one fighting to protect it," the "Homeland" and "The Princess Bride" actor said in one such video.

Patinkin, who is also Jewish, said that El-Sayed's Republican opponent, Mike Rogers, was pushing a political movement attacking the "rights and dignity of certain people" and argued that El-Sayed was the only candidate fighting for democracy.

"Jewish safety is tied to the health of our democracy," Patinkin said. "We can’t protect one without protecting the other. And in this Senate race, Abdul is the candidate who understands that and is willing to fight for it." 

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Patinkin continued to voice his support for El-Sayed in another video posted on Sunday, in which he called out efforts to make people "afraid" of the Democratic candidate because of his name and Muslim background, suggesting the criticism was similar to how Jewish people have been treated because of their identity.

"It’s hard for me to hear Muslims and Arabs talked about this way without thinking about our own Jewish history," Patinkin said. "We know what it’s like to have people treat your identity as a reason to distrust you, to make you seem threatening just because of who you are. I’m not telling anyone what they have to believe about Abdul. I’m asking people to recognize that this kind of talk should sound familiar to Jews." 

"Who is going to protect the democracy that has helped keep Jews safe in America? Abdul," he added. "Who is going to stand up for the rights of all of us? Abdul. Because I believe protecting our community means protecting the democracy we all depend on. Please vote for Abdul El-Sayed and get him in the Senate seat."

Fox News Digital reached out to the El-Sayed and Rogers campaigns for comment but did not immediately receive a response.

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Rabbi Yaakov Menken, managing director of the Coalition for Jewish Values, criticized Patinkin's "lack of actual knowledge" about whether El-Sayed would support Jewish safety.

"Few candidates have expressed disdain for Jewish safety more than Abdul El-Sayed, who attempted to explain away a terror attack on Jewish preschoolers due to a war on terror 6,000 miles away, and who called the rescue of Jewish hostages from torture, rape, and murder, ‘genocide,’" Menken told Fox News Digital. 

El-Sayed caused controversy in March when he responded to an attack on a Michigan synagogue by saying "Hurt people, hurt people." Federal investigators say a gunman inspired and radicalized by Hezbollah crashed into the place of worship seeking to kill as many Jewish people as he could. The alleged attacker was a Lebanese-born man who a week earlier had lost relatives in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon.

El-Sayed later apologized for his comments about the attack. 

Menken said the Democratic candidate "refused to endorse the right of Jews to their own identity, opinions, and self-governance, and campaigned alongside Hasan Piker until other Democrats prevailed upon him to stop. And, of course, when confronted about family ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and its genocidal antisemitism, El-Sayed has called it an attack on his religion." 

"To call Patinkin deluded and naive would be the height of understatement," the rabbi added. "El-Sayed's values are not those that made America a great and welcoming country."

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Patinkin previously supported New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani's 2025 campaign, celebrating the first night of Hanukkah with the democratic socialist after he was elected. 

Throughout his campaign and since taking office, Mamdani has faced accusations of antisemitism.

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Fox News' Paul Steinhauser and Peter D'Abrosca contributed to this report.