Rep. Shri Thanedar may be in serious trouble in Detroit.
The Michigan Democrat, first elected to Congress in 2022, is facing a hard-charging primary challenge from state Rep. Donavan McKinney, a progressive backed by Justice Democrats, Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Rashida Tlaib.
The race in Michigan’s 13th Congressional District has become another test of how far left Democratic voters are willing to go in 2026.
Thanedar already has a progressive voting record, but McKinney is running to his left and is a member of the Democratic Socialists of America.
That has turned the Detroit-based race into a messy intraparty fight between a wealthy incumbent and a socialist-backed challenger arguing the district needs a more aggressive working-class voice.
The only public poll of the race came from the progressive group Data for Progress.
It showed Thanedar leading McKinney by just 4 points, 46% to 42%, among 324 likely voters surveyed from July 9 to July 15.
Prediction markets have been far more bullish on McKinney.
As of Tuesday morning, McKinney had an 88% chance of winning on both Kalshi and Polymarket.
McKinney told Newsweek on Tuesday he is “super optimistic” about his chances of winning the primary.
He said there is a “lot of energy on the ground” and momentum for his campaign in Detroit.
“People feel like they’re being left behind. They don’t feel heard. They don’t feel like their needs are being addressed. That’s all I hear from day in and day out in my district when I’m out knocking doors and out in my community,” he said.
McKinney said a win over Thanedar would send a national message for the progressive movement.
“It shows the rest of the country that this movement is about the people, no matter where they live at, no matter what state, no matter what community, no matter what block they live on—that working class champions and the working class vision beat all this corporate, dirty money,” he said. “This is about the many versus the money.”
Thanedar told Newsweek that voters in the district “just want someone who will fight for them.”
He pointed to his support for Medicare for All, free child care, free higher education and student-loan forgiveness.
Thanedar also highlighted his push to impeach President Donald Trump and his effort to end qualified immunity for ICE agents.
“So that’s the kind of fighter people are looking for and that’s what I’ve been doing in Congress. When ICE announced they bought a warehouse in my district to make it a detention facility, I held a town hall and press conference to oppose the facility,” he wrote, while also casting his opponent as an “opportunist” and “ineffective.”
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The irony is that Thanedar is hardly a centrist Democrat.
He has backed a long list of liberal priorities and built much of his brand around anti-Trump politics.
But in today’s Democratic Party, that may not be enough.
McKinney’s support from Sanders and Tlaib gives him credibility with the party’s activist wing, which has been looking for another scalp after years of frustration with older incumbents and wealthy officeholders.
Thanedar has also faced criticism from Democrats over the years, including after he was accused of using taxpayer funds to promote his constituent services on billboards, according to The Detroit News.
The Detroit-area seat is safely Democratic, meaning the primary is effectively the real fight.
That has only intensified the left-on-left battle between Thanedar and McKinney.
For Republicans watching from the sidelines, the race is another reminder of where the Democratic base is moving.
A sitting progressive congressman can back impeaching Trump, support Medicare for All and oppose ICE protections, then still find himself attacked as not left-wing enough.
Thanedar entered the final stretch with a narrow polling lead.
McKinney entered it with the momentum narrative, the activist endorsements and prediction markets overwhelmingly on his side.
In Detroit, that may be the difference between surviving another term and becoming the latest Democrat swallowed by his own party’s left flank.
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