Abdul El-Sayed furiously responded to a journalist with Sky News who approached him during the mid term elections.
El-Sayed won his contest in Michgan, beating Republican Mike Rogers to become the first Muslim elected to the US Senate.
It came after a hotly contested election, in which Democratic nominee Haley Stevens endorsed Rogers in the election after losing to El-Sayed in the primary, sparking outrage.
But this was not the only heated interaction that El-Sayed had on the campaign trail, with another involving Sky News US correspondent James Matthews.
Matthews had approached El-Sayed to ask him about the midterm elections.
El-Sayed responded: “Are you registered to vote in the state of Michigan?”
When Matthews responded that he is not, El-Sayed added: “So why would I care to have a conversation with you?”
Matthews said ‘I’m a journalist’, to which El-Sayed said: “In the UK, you know how many votes I wanna get in the UK? Zero! I am never running for office in the UK.”
The reporter then pushed back, saying that ‘this election matters to the world’, but El-Sayed was unmoved, saying: “I do not care what you think or the questions you ask.”
El-Sayed won the senatorial race in Michigan (Salwan Georges/Getty Images)
Matthews continued to speak to El-Sayed, explaining that he wanted to interview him as he is ‘bidding to be a senator’, but El-Sayed still continued, asking: “A senator in what country?”
He then went on to claim that ‘Sky News is not viewed in the United States of America’, before concluding: “I am going to ask you, please, to stop chasing me around.”
Matthews responded: “I’m not chasing you around, I’m asking you questions.”
Matthews’ colleague, Sky News political editor Beth Rigby, also weighed in on the interaction with a post on her social media page where she commended how Matthews handled the situation, writing: “Our @jamesmatthewsky doing his job & handling this altercation brilliantly.”
She added: “Of course the US midterms matter beyond the US.”
Footage of the interaction circulated on social media, drawing widespread attention.
One person wrote about the interaction: “Totally bizarre? Surely would have been quicker to answer the question. Being rude to journalists not quite picture of the ‘anti-Trump’.”
The elections were viewed as a test for Donald Trump (Brendan SMIALOWSKI / AFP via Getty Images)
Another wrote: “International media attending a high-profile race in a highly consequential midterm election is hardly surprising.”
Nonetheless, others defended El-Sayed’s behaviour.
The incident has come as the Democrats have won a resounding victory in the midterms, giving Donald Trump a bloody nose in his second term in the White House.
The Democrats seized control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate from the Republicans, winning 54 seats, including two allied independents, in the Senate, and having secured a majority in the House of Representatives with a large number of seats still to declare.
It’s a resounding result for an election which has been widely viewed as a referendum on Donald Trump and the MAGA movement in the US more broadly, and with even Republican strongholds swinging to the blue, it’s sent a very clear message.
LADBible has approached representatives of Abdul El-Sayed for comment.
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