Rep. Shri Thanedar (D-MI) heads into Tuesday’s Democrat primary as the underdog against a Sanders-backed democratic socialist, with polling and prediction markets pointing to the wealthy incumbent losing his Detroit seat to the party’s insurgent left.
Thanedar faces state Rep. Donavan McKinney in the August 4 primary for Michigan’s 13th Congressional District, a contest that has become a proxy war between the Democrat establishment and the surging Democratic Socialists of America.
A mid-July Data for Progress survey put Thanedar up 46-42. But the lead was soft. Once voters saw biographies of both candidates, McKinney flipped it and led 48-41. Prediction markets tell a bleaker story for the incumbent. The day before the vote, they priced McKinney at roughly 87 percent.
Even Thanedar’s own colleagues have shown little interest in saving him, an apathy he concedes.
“It’s not like a high school,” Thanedar told NOTUS. “I’m not trying to be the most popular member of Congress.”
The two-term congressman is a former DSA member himself. Thanedar renounced his membership in October 2023, saying the group failed to adequately condemn Hamas after the October 7 attack on Israel. Now the same movement is working to end his career.
McKinney, a 34-year-old who grew up poor in Detroit, is running on Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, and ending U.S. military aid to Israel. He was Justice Democrats’ first endorsed candidate of the cycle and has picked up backing from Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), and Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN).
“This election is about the many versus the money,” McKinney said.
The money belongs to Thanedar, who emigrated from India in 1979, worked as a janitor, and built a fortune as a pharmaceutical executive. He reported roughly $4.7 million on hand heading into the final stretch and has loaned his campaign more than $2 million this cycle, including $800,000 in June. McKinney raised about $1.3 million for the cycle and entered the primary’s final weeks with roughly $264,000.
Thanedar rejected the idea that he owes corporate donors, pointing instead to his record against President Donald Trump.
“There’s nobody fighting harder than me against Trump,” he said.
Michigan hosted a same-day Senate race, where Sanders-backed socialist Abdul El-Sayed entered election day leading establishment Rep. Haley Stevens, and DSA insurgents continue toppling Democrat incumbents from New York to Colorado. The district’s roughly 78 percent Democrat base means Tuesday’s winner is heavily favored to take the seat in November.
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