Global Courant 2023-04-11 23:23:51
Republican Bernie Moreno, who was running for the 2022 GOP Senate nomination in Ohio, will formally announce a 2024 campaign in the coming days.
A source close to Moreno confirms that the businessman is expected to formally announce his candidacy next week. Moreno filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission on Monday as a first step toward launching a campaign in hopes of beating Democrat Senator Sherrod Brown next year in a race that could determine whether the GOP wins the Senate majority. recovers.
Moreno, a successful Cleveland businessman and luxury car dealership giant who spent millions of his own money running television commercials to boost his Senate bid, suspended his first Senate campaign last February after requested and held a private meeting with former President Donald Trump.
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Ohio GOP Senate candidate Bernie Moreno speaks to the GOP of Coshocton County on August 22, 2021. (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.
Moreno, an immigrant who legally arrived in the US from Colombia as a boy with his family, made border security a top priority during his 2022 Senate campaign and visited the US-Mexico border
“Today, Bernie filed paperwork with the FEC as he continues to explore a candidate for the U.S. Senate,” the source told Fox News Monday night. “Bernie has spoken to voters, business leaders, conservative activists and donors across the state in recent weeks and has received overwhelming encouragement to run.”
Ohio GOP Senate candidate Bernie Moreno appears in a TV commercial in early 2022 amid a massive ad blitz before ending his campaign. (Bernie Moreno Senate campaign)
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 prosecutor and assistant attorney general of Ohio traveled along the US-Mexico border in Arizona last week to draw attention to the fentanyl crisis in his home state and the flow of drugs across the country’s southern border.
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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. behind former state treasurer Josh Mandel.
Senator Sherrod Brown (Joshua A. Bickel/Bloomberg via Getty Images/File)
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 a high-class battlefield but has gone red in the past six years.
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Rep. Warren Davidson and Secretary of State Frank LaRose of Ohio are among other Republicans considering a Senate bid.
Democrats currently control the U.S. Senate with a 51-49 majority, but Republicans are eyeing a very favorable Senate map in 2024, with Democrats defending 23 of the 34 seats up for grabs. Three of those seats are in red states that Trump wore in 2020: Ohio, Montana, and West Virginia. Five others are in key swing states narrowly swept by Biden in 2020: Arizona, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.