Global Courant 2023-04-18 15:00:23
EXCLUSIVE – Giving up his image as an outsider and conservative, Republican Bernie Moreno is formally announcing his second consecutive campaign for the Senate in Ohio.
“When insiders lose, we win. I’m Bernie Moreno. I’m a conservative outsider running for Senate. Together we’re turning Washington inside out,” Moreno said in a video that launched his campaign and was first shared with Fox News on Tuesday.
Moreno, a successful Cleveland businessman and luxury car dealership giant, is jumping into an upcoming 2024 GOP Senate election in Ohio in hopes of running against Democrat Sen. next year. Sherrod Brown in a race that could determine whether Republicans win the Senate majority.
In his video, Moreno targeted both Democrats and Republicans, claiming that “we are losing our country because corrupt and cowardly politicians from both sides are betraying us.”
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“President Trump set us on a path to prosperity, but today China is buying our land, drugs are pouring into our borders while our tax dollars are flowing abroad and our jobs are flowing abroad. The country we love is being ruined by insider politicians, Moreno charged. “Now I’m running for Senate and you guessed it, I’d be an outsider in Washington too. I’m not a career politician. I’ve never held office. I’m doing this because I firmly believe that career politicians put us in a ditch and we need outsiders to fix this country.”
And Moreno also argued that “new leaders are needed who are willing to fight to save the America First values we share.”
Moreno, an immigrant who legally arrived in the US from Colombia as a five-year-old boy with his family, made border security a top priority during his 2022 Senate campaign and visited the US-Mexico border. He donated millions of his own money to run TV commercials to try and raise his first Senate bid, but he suspended his campaign last February after requesting and holding a private meeting with former President Donald Trump.
Republican Bernie Moreno, in a campaign ad during his bid for the 2022 GOP Senate nomination in Ohio. On April 18, 2023, Moreno launched a campaign for the Senate nomination in 2024. (Bernie Moreno Senate campaign)
The crowded and flammable 2022 GOP Senate nomination in Ohio was ultimately won by former hedge fund manager and best-selling author JD Vance, who won Trump’s endorsement just before last May’s primary. Vance then defeated longtime Democrat Representative Tim Ryan in last November’s general election to succeed outgoing GOP Senator Rob Portman.
Trump launched his third bid for the White House in November and is currently the clear frontrunner in the GOP 2024 presidential nomination race. Moreno endorsed Trump in February, and last week the former president waded into the 2024 Republican Senate primary, saying in a social media post that Moreno is a “highly respected businessman from the GREAT STATE OF OHIO.”
The former president went on to write that Moreno is “considering running for Senate. He wouldn’t be easy to beat, especially against Brown, one of the worst in the Senate!”
Former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign event on Monday, March 13, 2023 in Davenport, Iowa. (AP Photo/Ron Johnson) (AP)
After leaving the 2022 Senate primary, Moreno seemed to forge a close relationship with Vance, helping the then-GOP nominee raise money and campaign across Ohio. And he played the role of Ryan in Vance’s general election debate preparations.
While Moreno has the ability to fund himself, his advisers tell Fox News that he is expected to aggressively fundraise, as he did in the 2022 cycle. Moreno had the largest fundraising quarter of the 2022 GOP Senate candidates, with a yield of $2.25 million in Spring 2021.
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Moreno becomes the second prominent Republican in Ohio and the second GOP candidate from the 2022 cycle to start a 2024 Senate campaign, following state senator Matt Dolan. The former Ohio district attorney and assistant attorney general toured the US-Mexico border in Arizona two weeks ago to draw attention to Ohio’s fentanyl crisis and the flow of drugs across the country’s southern border.
Ohio Republican Senate nominee Matt Dolan (center) tours the Tucson, Arizona sector of the U.S.-Mexico border on April 3, 2023. (Matt Dolan campaign)
Dolan — whose family owns Major League Baseball’s Cleveland Guardians — has also spent millions of dollars of his own money running ads for his 2022 Senate bid. Vance and just behind former state treasurer Josh Mandel.
Representative Warren Davidson and Secretary of State Frank LaRose of Ohio are among other Republicans considering a Senate bid.
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Moreno will embark on a statewide campaign tour Tuesday, with stops in Gahanna, in the Columbus suburbs; Milford, in suburban Cincinnati; Xenia, which is east of Dayton, and a city hall in Cleveland at night. On Wednesday, Moreno will campaign in northwestern Ohio, stopping in Lima, Findlay and Toledo. He kicks off Thursday with a visit to Coshocton, about 60 miles east of Columbus.
Senator Sherrod Brown, a Democrat from Ohio, speaks at an event in Covington, Kentucky, on Wednesday, January 4, 2023. Photographer: Joshua A. Bickel/Bloomberg via Getty Images (Joshua A. Bickel/Bloomberg)
The winner of next year’s GOP primary will challenge Brown, who is the only Democrat to win statewide in Ohio in the past decade. Brown will be heavily targeted by Republicans in a state that was once the main battleground of the general election but has turned red over the past six years.
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Ohio Democratic Party spokesman Reeves Oyster argued in a statement last week that “the Republican primaries for the Senate seat in Ohio are heating up and will only get nastier from here as Republicans are forced to slog with mud.” throwing money, burning money and pushing an agenda that is spiraling out of control.” step with the values of Ohioans to move forward. It is already clear that whoever emerges from these primaries will be bruised, battered and unpopular with the voters who will decide the general election. “
Paul Steinhauser is a political reporter from New Hampshire.
