Ohio's Senate race between Sherrod Brown and Bernie Moreno: What to know

Ohio’s hotly contested Senate race is one of a few that could cost Democrats their razor-slim majority in November, but polls have consistently placed Sen. Sherrod Brown ahead of his GOP challenger Bernie Moreno. 

Multiple polls say Brown, a Democrat who’s been in the Senate since 2007, is up 4-6 points over Moreno, a wealthy Colombian-born businessman and car dealership owner from Cleveland. 

Moreno, who’s backed by former President Donald Trump, is trailing in a state where Trump is expected to win by double digits: Once a premier swing state, Ohio has moved sharply to the right in recent years. 

READ MORE: Swing states: Why these 7 states could decide the 2024 presidential election

Trump easily won the state in 2016 and 2020, and the GOP controls top statewide offices along with both chambers of the legislature. Trump’s running mate is Sen. JD Vance, the other senator from Ohio. 

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Republicans had early hopes that Brown couldn’t overcome Ohio’s strong political shift – but polls suggest Brown could remain the last statewide elected Democrat in the Buckeye State. 

Who is Sherrod Brown? 

Brown, 71, was born in Mansfield, Ohio, and worked in academia before entering politics. The son and grandson of doctors, Brown graduated from Yale University, got his master’s degree at the Ohio State University and has an honorary doctorate from Capital University, according to his bio on Gallaudet University’s website. 

Before he began his career in politics, he worked with the Ohio State University's Mershon Center for International Security Studies, "where he wrote the curriculum and trained teachers and educators in Poland about democracy after the Communist government fell."

Brown previously served in the Ohio House of Representatives, as Ohio’s secretary of state, and as a Rep. for Ohio’s 13th congressional district before he was elected to the Senate in 2006. 

His wife is author and Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist Connie Schultz. They have four children. 

Who is Bernie Moreno? 

Moreno, 57, was born in Colombia to a wealthy family before immigrating to Florida as a child and becoming a U.S. citizen at the age of 18, according to a biography on his website. He purchased his first car dealership in 2005 and used his wealth to build an empire that came to include high-end dealerships in multiple states.

Moreno has pitched himself as a political outsider and immigrant whose family built its way out of rudimentary beginnings in the U.S. thanks to the American dream. His opponents have questioned his origin story and point to his family’s deep political connections in both the United States and Colombia, The Associated Press reports. 

Moreno built his fortune as a luxury car dealer and blockchain entrepreneur. If elected, he would be among the top eight wealthiest senators, based on the most recent data from the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics, with an estimated net worth between $25.5 million and $105.7 million.

He and his wife, Bridget, live in Westlake, Ohio. They have four children. 

Issue: Reproductive rights

What Brown has said

Brown has made abortion access and reproductive rights a centerpiece of his reelection campaign. He has touted his support for abortion access, while emphasizing that his GOP challenger favors a national abortion ban. 

READ MORE: Abortion access 2024: Here’s where the laws stand in your state

What Moreno has said

Moreno has said he would vote for a national abortion ban of 15 weeks. 

Issue: Economy/Inflation

What Brown has said

Brown has pointed to corporate greed as a key driver of inflation, particularly corporations that reduce the size of their products without also lowering prices – a practice known as "shrinkflation."

In February, Brown introduced a bill in the Senate that would order the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to formally recognize shrinkflation as an unfair or deceptive practice, and authorize FTC and state attorneys general to go after companies that do it. 

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"Let’s be clear: the fact that prices and corporate profits are going up at the same time is no coincidence," Brown said at a May Senate committee hearing.

"Of course I want businesses making money. I want American companies to be the most competitive and most profitable in the world," Brown continued. "What I am against is corporate profiteering that funnels money from working people to executives in the form of massive bonuses and stock buybacks. I am against markets that don’t foster competition and low prices. I am against market manipulation."

What Moreno has said

Like Trump, Moreno has said the way to bring down inflation is to increase energy production (U.S. oil production was at an all-time high in 2023). 

Lawmakers who support more drilling say the boost in energy production would bring down energy costs, which would reduce the overhead for other goods and services. 

Moreno has also said that Trump’s plan to deport millions of migrants immediately after taking office would help to ease inflation, along with cutting government spending. 

Issue: Immigration

What Brown has said

Brown backed the bipartisan border security bill, which was endorsed by the Border Patrol union and would have beefed up immigration infrastructure. 

READ MORE: Immigration and Border Security: Harris vs. Trump

Despite bipartisan support in crafting the bill, most Republicans voted against it earlier this year when Trump told them not to give the Biden administration anything that could be interpreted as an election-year win.

What Moreno has said

Moreno has taken a hardline stance on immigration. In an interview with Axios, he said he wants to bar people from seeking asylum for life if they illegally enter the U.S. or fail to first apply for protection in a country they traveled through. 

He supports Trump’s mass deportation plan and wants migrants to wait outside the U.S. until their asylum cases are processed. 

"We're not going to give you the citizenship test in any other language but English," Moreno told Axios. 

"They learn the language, like I did. They assimilate, like I did. They understand the culture, like I did," he said at a recent campaign event in Wilmington, Ohio.