Abdul El-sayed uses physician title despite no Michigan or New York license
Abdul el-sayed has been publicly calling himself a physician even though state medical licensing records do not show him holding a physician’s license in Michigan or New York. He used the title last month at a Detroit debate and still lists it on LinkedIn, putting his professional background back under scrutiny in a tight Democratic Senate primary.
Detroit Debate And LinkedIn
At the Council of Baptist Pastors debate in Detroit last month, he introduced himself as “a physician and epidemiologist.” His LinkedIn page still identifies him as a physician. The dispute lands in a race that includes Rep. Haley Stevens and state Sen. Mallory McMorrow, where professional biography can shape how voters judge each candidate’s experience.
El Sayed’s medical training is real. He studied at the University of Michigan Medical School, earned an M.D. from Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, and later completed a doctorate in public health at Oxford University. He also taught epidemiology at Columbia before returning to Michigan to lead Detroit’s health department as its executive director and health officer.
2018 Campaign Questions
The issue is not new. Questions about his use of the physician title surfaced during his 2018 gubernatorial campaign, when Crain’s Detroit Business reported that he publicly identified as a doctor despite not holding a Michigan medical license. Roxie Richner, defending the title, said he had earned it “twice over.”
Michigan law bars people from representing themselves in a way that would lead others to believe they are licensed or authorized to practice medicine if they do not hold a valid medical license. El Sayed’s own past description of his training points to the gap at the center of the dispute: in a 2022 podcast interview, he said his direct patient-care experience was a four-week sub-internship at a small Manhattan hospital near the end of medical school, which he called “the worst doctor on the team” and likened to “cosplaying a doctor.”
Michigan Primary Race
He has also continued to describe himself as a physician in public-facing materials while competing in a three-way Democratic primary. His campaign did not directly answer questions about why he has publicly referred to himself that way, leaving voters to weigh the title he uses against the licenses state records do not show.
For readers trying to sort the claim from the record, the practical point is simple: Michigan and New York licensing files do not show him as a licensed physician, while his campaign language and past interviews show he has continued to present himself using that profession. In a close race, that mismatch is the fact that is likely to keep getting tested.
