Abraham Aiaysh, a former Michigan House majority floor leader, has officially announced his run for the state’s newly redrawn first state Senate district.
Aiyash, who represented Hamtramck and parts of Detroit from 2020 to 2024 in the House, announced Monday he would be running in the seat currently represented by Sen. Erika Geiss, D-Taylor. He told Michigan Chronicle he was running for the seat in December after filing his campaign committee last fall.
The seat was redrawn by the Michigan Citizens Redistricting Commission following the approved redistricting efforts after being sued for racial bias. The new district map stretches from part of Detroit through Downriver communities including Lincoln Park, River Rouge, Wyandotte and Ecorse.
“All across the district, folks have complained about how large utility bills have been compared to last year, the month prior — people need relief,” Aiyash said. “People have lost trust in government and the Democratic party. This campaign is about rebuilding that trust and delivering on our promises. The consistent concern we’ve heard is it is expensive as hell to live in Michigan and afford to raise a family.”
In its latest rate case, DTE told the state’s public utility commission that it needed to increase customer rates to fund infrastructure investments to improve the reliability of the grid while moving toward cleaner sources of energy generation.
“Natural gas plays a vital role in everyday life — from heating homes to cooking meals,” DTE president and COO Bob Richard said in a statement. “This request allows us to continue investing in the safety and reliability of our system, while keeping costs low for the customers who depend on us for generations to come.”
The rejection of DTE’s justification for raising prices has become a rallying cry for local candidates of both parties, despite the public utility deploying some of the most expensive lobbying of any special interest in the state.
Aiyash’s launch event Monday featured remarks from his endorsers, including Laborers’ International Union of North America members who took the stage at the IBEW Local 58 in Corktown.
Elected officials and candidates in attendance included Detroit City Council member Denzel McCampbell; Detroit state Reps. Donavan McKinney; Tonya Meyers Philips; Sens. Stephanie Chang; Stephanie Young; former Downriver Rep. Jamie Churches; 2nd State Senate District candidate Abbas Aliewu; plus 3rd State Senate District candidates Eboni Taylor and John Conyers III.
The Democratic primary race for the new 1st District seat is shaping up to be competitive.
Justin Onwenu, a Mary Sheffield appointee and the former entrepreneurship director under Mayor Mike Duggan, announced he would run for the seat in October. Onwenu, an environmental organizer who became a city economic development leader, announced Monday he earned endorsements from five of the nine Detroit City Council members.
The dynamic in the race between Aiyash and Onwenu is viewed by politicos as one pitting competing styles of progressivism, with Onwenu attracting the more politically moderate base.
Aiyash said he would aim to put community over corporate interests, proposing free universal childcare for Michiganders and an end to the so-called “zip-code tax” which causes Detroit residents to pay higher auto-insurance prices.
Aiyash said freezing DTE rates is already an active effort happening in Lansing. He pointed to SB 768, introduced last month by Sen. Kevin Hertel, D-Saint Clair Shores, which prohibits utilities from filing a rate case earlier than three years after the utility’s last rate case.
Aiyash says he would push that window to five years, effectively locking the current rate.
“The utilities claim data centers are going to be a massive boom for the state. Consumers Energy commissioned a report claiming that thousands of jobs and up to $5.5 billion could come to Michigan. If data centers are such a good opportunity, working residents who have seen rates go up 120% in the last 20 years, should be getting a break.”
Aiyash’s pitch to lock rates for five years comes as officials from both political parties opposing the public utility’s annual price increases.
Both Republican candidate for governor Tom Leonard and the Democratic frontrunner to become the party’s nominee for governor, Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson, has suggested freezing DTE rates.
“On her first day as governor, Benson would declare an electricity cost freeze to give families relief from excessive energy costs and demand a transparent, accountable rate-setting process,” Alyssa Bradley, communications director for Benson’s gubernatorial campaign, told the Detroit News.
In 2023, Aiyash became the first Arab-American majority leader of the House of Representatives. He also became the highest-ranking Muslim American in the state’s legislative history.
Aiyash said the piece of legislation he was most proud to pass while serving in the House is his sentencing guidelines laws for prosecutors.
“I created a commission to reform Michigan’s sentencing guidelines that have not been changed since 1988,” Aiyash said. “As a result, the state will waste less money on locking people up for petty crimes and have more balance in the justice system.”
Aiyash was also the lead sponsor on the the clean energy and jobs act, which Gov. Gretchen Whitmer hailed as one of the most progressive climate bills in the country.
