It’s been a busy week for Sherrod Brown and Bernie Moreno – and for reporters covering one of the hottest U.S. Senate races in the country.
Brown, the Democratic incumbent, and his Republican challenger, first-time candidate and businessman Moreno, are making their closing arguments in what most polls show as a toss up. The race could decide control of the U.S. Senate, so it’s drawn historic levels of spending and endless annoying political ads to our fair state.
Here’s a snapshot from the notebook that I’ve been filling during my recent travels and what I think it means for the final days of the Nov. 5 election.
Moreno is a all about that base
Moreno described being recognized recently by a classroom full of six-year-olds – after starting the race with just 4% of voters knowing who he is.
“Way too many ads when six-year-olds recognize me,” Moreno told reporters during a campaign stop in Columbus on Monday. “And one raises his hand and goes, ‘You’re going to win.’”
“Why do you say that?,’” Moreno said he asked, quickly offering the boy’s response. ““He goes, ‘Because Sherrod Brown is just too liberal for Ohio.’”
Moreno then delivered a political punch line.
“A six-year-old understands this race,” he said.
The anecdote not only shows the confidence – real or otherwise – Moreno has displayed since winning his party’s nomination in March with a big hand from former President Donald Trump. It also shows how simple his electoral strategy is: win Republican votes in a Republican-leaning state.
That’s why he’s spent the week rallying the GOP base, riding in a bright red bus with Trump’s face plastered on the side, with some outside help. Donald Trump Jr., the former president’s son, and Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina appeared with Moreno on Tuesday in Mount Vernon and in Strongsville. The stop in Mount Vernon drew a crowd, which Moreno’s campaign highlighted in the Trumpiest way possible. I tried to attend the event in Strongsville, which also was well attended, but was foiled in a very Strongsville-y fashion: bad traffic and a lack of parking.
Other top Republican surrogates are expected to come to Ohio this week, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis on Friday and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson in Wilmington on Sunday.
Moreno fine-tunes his abortion position
Moreno seemed relaxed on Monday, but he still hasn’t perfected a smooth answer on abortion, the topic where Democrats have by far their biggest political advantage. When I asked him what role he expected the issue to play this Tuesday, Moreno called it “the only tool” Democrats have. He said no abortion-related legislation could feasibly move in the Senate. He said his focus instead includes limiting abortions by expanding contraception access for women and lowering adoption costs.
“The state of Ohio has spoken, and I’m going to respect the will of Ohio,” said Moreno, who once described himself as “100% pro-life with no exceptions” but more recently has settled on banning abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy. Trump has called it a state issue.
“Sherrod Brown thinks he knows better than the voters in every other state,” Moreno charged.
Does that mean he thinks abortion is a settled issue? Moreno said he “aspirationally” supports the national 15-week ban with “reasonable exceptions.”
“There’s no votes to do that naturally, and I recognize that,” he said. “But if we can get agreement, we can bring the country together on this very divisive issue. That’s what I’m trying to do. Sherrod Brown is trying to divide everybody on this issue.”
Brown stays on worker message, reaches to Black voters
Brown, meanwhile, is holding his final week’s schedule closer to the vest. His public events are a mix of union hall rallies and events targeting Black voters, including on Saturday in Columbus, where he’ll hold a church rally with U.S. Rep. Joyce Beatty.
Brown’s campaign also is using the final days to throw the kitchen sink at Moreno, whom they are trying to portray as a greedy businessman. The campaign is airing a video testimonial from a former Moreno employee who’s now helping Brown’s campaign. It has also promoted late endorsements from two old-school Republicans: former Gov. Bob Taft and Jim Petro, a former state attorney general. Democrats replaced both of them in 2006 election. (That year, Taft was term-limited and could not run for re-election. Democrat Ted Strickland became governor, defeating Republican Ken Blackwell, who defeated Petro in the gubernatorial primary. Democrat Marc Dann defeated Republican Betty Montgomery to become attorney general.)
On Tuesday night, Brown spoke at Teamsters Local 377 in Youngstown. Among the warm-up speakers was Bill Dean, the general president of the national Iron Workers union. (A few years ago, Brown helped push for a fix to the Iron Workers union’s pension problems.)
Dean said his union is focused on the “Blue Wall” states of Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
“But I told my team, if you think I’m coming through Ohio and forgetting my buddy Sherrod Brown, you got another thing coming,” Dean said.
Brown gave his standard union-hall stump speech, describing how international trade deals backed by both parties have hurt cities such as Mansfield, his hometown.
Two of Brown’s lines drew enthusiastic responses. One followed his description of his mother-in-law and father-in-law’s premature deaths, which Brown said was true of “too much of blue-collar America.” His description of himself as a fighter for women’s right to make their own healthcare decisions also triggered applause.
Afterward, Brown predicted he’ll win Trumbull and Mahoning counties, two counties Brown won in 2018 but Trump carried in 2020. If that were to happen, it would repeat his path to victory from his 2018 campaign, but it would cut strongly against the area’s increasingly Republican lean.
“I know that doesn’t fit the national narrative,” he said. “But you’re here, they’re here. Look at what’s happening in the Valley. Look at this kind of response.”
On Wednesday, Brown dropped by Yonder Brunch & Vibes, a brunch spot on Cleveland’s near East Side.
The restaurant happens to be a few doors down from the Cuyahoga County Democratic Party headquarters. Party leaders dropped by and talked about turnout with the senator. Also on hand were union representatives and Annette Blackwell, the mayor of the Cleveland suburb Maple Heights.
Brown took a few questions from Cleveland-area media, where he stayed on message by knocking Moreno’s business record.
Brown avoided being pulled into the debate about President Joe Biden’s recent comment that appeared to liken Trump supporters to “garbage.”
“I’ve heard that appearing,” Brown said. “I don’t know what that means.” (The president later said he meant to refer only to the comments of a comedian at a Trump rally who called Puerto Rico “garbage.”)
Early voting
There’s been a major shift in early voting this year in Ohio. Overall numbers are lagging behind the 2020 election, which is likely a historical outlier thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. But there’s been a clear shift among early voters away from mail and toward in-person voting, especially in rural areas.
Through Tuesday, 1.8 million Ohioans had voted early, according to the Ohio Secretary of State’s Office, compared to nearly 2.2 million at the equivalent time in 2020 and 1 million in 2016. In-person voting usually makes up around a third of the early vote. This year, it’s more than one-half.
Do the early numbers bode well for either party?
Republicans like what they’re seeing, although Democrats say they’re encouraged by who’s actually turning out to vote. But it’s hard to say for sure.
It’s tough under normal circumstances to draw useful conclusions about what the early vote numbers might mean for the actual election results.
What I’d usually do is compare this year’s early vote numbers to early vote numbers from the last presidential election to look for changes in voter behavior. In the past, this kind of comparison has offered clues about voter enthusiasm in certain areas, which can foreshadow overall voter turnout.
But the clear shift in voter behavior has made my normal comparison less useful, and the 2020 election provides an especially unhelpful baseline.
That’s why this year I’m opting instead to compare the early votes cast so far to all votes cast in the 2020 election. This at least shows where voters are turning out at relatively higher rates.
That comparison shows an early-vote electorate that’s more rural and suburban and less urban than the 2020 electorate overall. On the surface, this is a favorable mix for Republicans.
Breaking that down further:
- Statewide, the 1.8 million early votes cast through Tuesday was equal to about 30.5% of the overall 2020 vote.
- In Ohio’s eight urban counties, voters cast 751,036 ballots, equal to 27.1% of all votes cast in those counties in the 2020 election.
- That’s compared to 73 rural counties, where voters have cast 787,825 early votes, equal to 33.3% of the 2020 vote in these counties.
- In suburban counties, voters have cast 277,408 early votes, 34.2% of the total 2020 vote in those counties.
Some of the disparity could be due to larger numbers of outstanding mail ballots in urban areas – absentee return rates are a little lower in urban counties and a little higher in rural counties – although there aren’t enough of these to explain the entire difference. Democrats hope to close the gap this weekend in the final days of early voting before the Tuesday election.
Which counties are which?
Readers might quibble with the categories – I’m just trying to keep things simple – but the following counties rate as urban for the purpose of this analysis: Cuyahoga, Franklin, Hamilton, Lucas, Mahoning, Montgomery, Stark and Summit.
The following are suburban: Butler, Delaware, Lake, Lorain, Warren and Wood counties.
The rest are rural, although Athens County, a rural area with a high percentage of Democratic voters thanks to the presence of Ohio University, gets its own special category.
Ohio’s closest races
In my short time at Signal Statewide, I’ve been focused on what I view as the closest, highest-profile races: the U.S. Senate race, three Ohio congressional seats that Democrats won in 2022 and Issue 1, the amendment that would change Ohio’s system of drawing its political district maps.
Based on polling and conversations with sources, I expect the Senate race and two congressional races – the matchups between Democratic Rep. Marcy Kaptur and Republican state Rep. Derek Merrin and between Akron Democratic Rep. Emilia Sykes and former Republican lawmaker Kevin Coughlin – to be close. The same seems to be true for Issue 1, although it’s really hard to tell what’s going on there.
We’ll find out what the story is on Election Day.
What the Ohio Supreme Court’s ruling against Yost means
On Wednesday, the Ohio Supreme Court issued an important ruling that’s going to get overshadowed by other political coverage. The court’s four Republican justices and three Democratic justices unanimously ruled that Republican Attorney General Dave Yost exceeded his authority earlier this year when he blocked a proposed left-leaning ballot measure from advancing before voters.
The court said Yost has no authority to block the “Ohio Voters Bill of Rights” for the reason he cited: the proposed title that would appear on petitions that ballot issue campaigns must circulate among voters to get on the ballot. It’s a rare example of a clear rebuke of state Republicans from the current court in a case with political ramifications.
The ruling will have consequences for what I see as a top political battleground in Ohio in the coming years: ballot issues. While Democrats have struggled to elect their candidates here, left-leaning groups have seen recent success in Ohio by taking measures directly to voters, like the abortion-rights amendment last November and, potentially, Issue 1 next week. (There’s no reason why right-leaning groups couldn’t pursue their own constitutional amendments, although it might be cheaper and easier for them to just lobby the legislature.)
One way Republicans can impede these left-leaning ballot measures is through the offices they hold that administer the ballot issue process. For example, any proposed amendments must first go through Yost, who signs off on whether required summaries that appear on voter petitions accurately reflect the measure’s effects. Yost blocked the Voters Bill of Rights over its title, causing it to fail to qualify for the November ballot, even though previous Republican attorneys general had given the green light to similar measures, including one now-Gov. Mike DeWine approved with an identical title in 2014.
The court unanimously ruled that Yost overstepped his legal authority, which is a win for current and future potential ballot issue campaigns.
Mark the calendar
Thursday and Friday: County boards of election will be open for early, in-person voting from 7:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Saturday: Early voting hours are 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Sunday: Early voting hours are 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. This is the final day of early, in-person voting.
Monday: Mail ballots must be postmarked by this date in order to be counted. They will count only if they arrive at county elections offices by Nov. 9, four days after the election.
Tuesday: Election Day. Polls are open from 6:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.
This post was updated to clarify that Bob Taft was term-limited in 2006 and therefore did not run for governor that year.
