Cleveland entrepreneur Bernie Moreno emerged victorious in Ohio’s Republican Senate primary on Tuesday, following a closely contested race that continued to draw attention even after a recent visit by former President Donald Trump, who had endorsed another candidate.
Moreno secured the win despite facing fierce competition from Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose and Cleveland-area state Sen. Matt Dolan, whose aggressive campaigning and significant spending may have repercussions for Moreno as he prepares for the general election this fall.
In the upcoming race, Moreno will go head-to-head with three-term Democratic U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, a prominent figure in Ohio politics and one of the Democrats considered most vulnerable this year.
The forthcoming general election battle is anticipated to be fiercely contested in a state that has shown a Republican-leaning trend in recent years. Democrats, holding a delicate 51-49 voting majority in the Senate but defending more seats than Republicans, recognize Senator Sherrod Brown’s seat as a prime target for the GOP. Brown stands as the sole Democrat holding a non-judicial statewide office in Ohio, a state that has steadily shifted towards the right during the Trump administration.
In a move met with criticism from both sides of the aisle, the Senate Majority PAC, an independent group aligned with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, invested $2.7 million to boost Bernie Moreno’s primary campaign, anticipating him as the weakest contender against Brown in the upcoming election.
Brown is expected to center his campaign around abortion rights. Following the Supreme Court’s 2022 ruling overturning the constitutional right to abortion, Ohioans rallied in strong support of a state constitutional amendment last year aimed at safeguarding access to the procedure.
During the final stages of the campaign, Moreno, a former luxury car dealer and blockchain entrepreneur, faced controversy.
According to a report by the Associated Press last week, in 2008, an individual with access to Moreno’s work email account created a profile on an adult website soliciting “Men for 1-on-1 sex.” However, the AP could not definitively confirm whether Moreno himself created the profile.
Moreno’s attorney stated that a former intern, Dan Ricci, was responsible for creating the account, and Ricci provided a statement asserting that it was part of a juvenile prank.
Concerns surrounding the profile have been circulating within GOP circles for the past month, leading to frustration among senior Republican figures regarding Moreno’s potential vulnerability in the general election. Seven individuals directly familiar with discussions on addressing the issue disclosed that they requested anonymity to avoid potential repercussions from Trump and his allies.