A Bruce Springsteen Fan Club Broke Up After He Endorsed Abdul El-Sayed

In a preview of Thanksgiving dinners around the country, the “Spring-Nuts,” a Facebook Fan Club for Bruce Springsteen with 18,000 members, broke up because The Boss’s endorsement of now-Senator Elect Abdul El-Sayed opened a rift in the group with the moderators on one side and the membership on the other.

“As the world grew increasingly divisive, hostile, those tensions inevitably spilled into our little corner of the E Street world,” moderator Howie Chaz and wife Julie said in a statement. “What should have been respectful differences of opinion too often deteriorated into personal attacks, bullying, insults, and some genuinely vile and hateful rhetoric.”

According to the Asbury Park Press (paywalled link), Chaz named the breaking point as Springsteen’s endorsement of El-Sayed in Michigan. Chaz does not like El-Sayed or his association with streamer Hasan Piker.

“Mr. Sayed campaigned with Hasan Piker who openly made horrific statements that America deserved 9/11,” Chaz complained. “After a Michigan synagogue was attacked back in March, obviously an act of terrorism, Sayed rationalized it by saying ‘Hurt people hurt people’ standing right next to the antisemitic streamer Hasan Piker who made the despicable 9/11 statement.” After the Asbury Park Press published its story on Monday, the 11-year-old “Spring-Nuts” Facebook group was deleted.

While Springsteen himself has been generous about sharing his opinions, he’s actually pretty stingy about giving out his endorsement. As far as I can tell he’s only publicly endorsed six candidates, all in the last 22 years: John Kerry in 2004, Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, Hilary Clinton in 2016, Joe Biden in 2020, Kamala Harris in 2024, and now for the first time, a candidate for Senate, Abdul El-Sayed.

This is hardly the first time El-Sayed has provoked strong opinions. Right before Halloween, Kid Rock compared El-Sayed to the 9/11 hijackers, while fellow Michigander Eminem granted his music to El-Sayed’s final get-out-the-vote video.