Three degrees of Trumpiness: Ohio’s Republican Senate candidates clash

Three Republicans seeking to take on Sen. Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, in the fall took aim at each other during a debate Wednesday night as they tried to portray themselves as the most conservative candidate in a closely contested primary.

It is a rare Senate race in which an endorsement from former President Donald J. Trump has not cleared the Republican field.

Trump’s favored candidate, Bernie Moreno, a former car dealer from Cleveland, has repeatedly cast himself as an outsider as he touted his endorsements, including his support from Ohio’s other senator, J.D. Vance. Frank LaRose, Ohio’s secretary of state, has presented himself as a “battle-tested” candidate who has already won a statewide race. And Matt Dolan, a wealthy senator, has taken a more moderate path to promoting his support for “Trump policies” without explicitly backing Mr. Trump in the primaries.

The primary, on March 19, will lead to an expensive and closely watched clash with Mr. Brown in November. Republicans see the race as an excellent opportunity in the closely divided chamber.

The Republican primary candidates sparred for the third and final time at the debate, which was held in Oxford and hosted by Miami University and WLWT News 5. Here are five takeaways from the event and the broader race:

Trump is, as always, the North Star of the race.

Republican primaries these days often revolve around which candidate praises Trump the most, and Ohio candidates appear well aware that he won their increasingly red state by eight percentage points in both 2016 and 2020.

Mr. Moreno highlighted moments of support for Mr. Trump in Wednesday’s debate, as he has done at previous forums, defending Mr. Trump’s recent comments about NATO and later assuring viewers that the former president was “a good man” .

His competitors tried their own approaches.

Mr. LaRose, who last year incorrectly predicted that Trump would stay out of the primaries, pointed to the former president’s support for him in his 2022 race for secretary of state. He said Wednesday that while “some people may not like his personality abrasive,” Mr. Trump “was the kind of bold, courageous leader we need.”

Even Mr. Dolan, who declined to endorse Mr. Trump in the primaries, repeatedly said he had “enacted Trump policies” in the Ohio Legislature, pointing to issues like school choice and tax cuts. On Wednesday, after Nikki Haley withdrew from the presidential race and almost assuredly allowed Mr. Trump to win the nomination, Mr. Dolan said he would “support” the former president.

But Mr. Dolan had some caveats: “His personality? It’s not me. His political style? It’s not me. But his policies that make your life better, make America stronger, make Ohio stronger – that’s me.”

Each of the candidates delved into their rivals’ past and recent comments Wednesday night in an effort to prove their conservative bona fides.

Each candidate suggested that voters should question the other candidates’ motives. They repeatedly bickered over each other’s records on gun control, immigration policy, abortion and support for Mr. Trump.

“Who do you trust?” Mr. LaRose said it bluntly in his opening statement. “You’ll hear a lot of talking points from both of my opponents tonight. They’re both desperate to convince you that they’re conservative.’

Moments later, Mr. Moreno played up his support for Trump by accusing his rivals of being part of the “Nikki Haley, Liz Cheney, Mitt Romney wing of the party,” a jab at Mr. Trump’s traditional conservatism trampled.

And Mr. Dolan accused his opponents of “reinventing themselves for their political interests,” a comment he has made repeatedly, often noting that they did not immediately support Trump’s first run for office in 2016.

Abortion is again difficult for the Republicans.

Last fall, more than 56 percent of Ohioans voted to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution. Republicans have struggled to formulate a winning position on the issue, one that Senator Brown could focus on as all three of his would-be Republican opponents have expressed some support for a federal abortion ban.

The Republican candidates characterized Mr. Brown as taking an “extreme” position on the issue (although he has said he was). was against ‘late-term abortion’) and expressed support for policies such as adoption services and access to contraception. No one explicitly mentioned in vitro fertilization, an issue on which Republicans are on the defensive following a recent Alabama court ruling that frozen embryos should be considered human beings.

Mr. Moreno reiterated Wednesday that he would support efforts at the federal level to “get to a 15-week standard, with some common sense restrictions in place after 15 weeks.”

Mr. Dolan and Mr. LaRose avoided directly addressing a federal ban during the debate. But in January, they both indicated they would support a federal ban to prevent late-term abortions, language used by abortion opponents to describe rare abortions after 21 weeks of pregnancy.

Mr. Dolan, by contrast, said Wednesday that he supported exceptions for the “life of the mother, rape and incest” and suggested his position was better if he took on Mr. Brown.

“I more accurately reflect where Ohioans sit today,” Mr. Dolan said.

Mr. LaRose, meanwhile, pointed to an endorsement from the Ohio Right to Life PAC, which endorsed both him and Mr. Moreno, but he did not say Wednesday whether he would support exceptions to abortion restrictions.

Border policy has gone big in one Midwestern state.

Immigration, including the influx of migrants at the southern border, has done just that has become a top concern among voters across the country — and the issue has risen to the top of Ohio politics, too.

The candidates had several debates over who was toughest on immigration, even though their platforms are quite similar.

They all labeled border security as an urgent concern, called for increased immigration enforcement and said they would support completing the border wall that Trump promised and did not complete. No one voiced support for the bipartisan border deal in Congress, which collapsed after Trump intervened.

That didn’t stop them from shooting each other. Although Mr. LaRose and Mr. Moreno have both said they support the deportation of all undocumented immigrants, they traded attacks during a debate last month, highlighting past comments that they said showed the other man was weak on that proposal.

Mr. Dolan has argued that the border should first be “sealed,” halting immigration. He said the administration could then determine how to deal with undocumented immigrants already in the country, noting that Ohio businesses “need workers.”

During the January debate, Mr. Dolan also called out Mr. Moreno’s call for “wiping out the drug cartels” as an “irresponsible statement,” shortly after Mr. Moreno similarly said Mr. LaRose had used “irresponsible rhetoric” in support of the drug cartels. US drone strikes in Mexico.

They tried to tie Sherrod Brown to Joe Biden.

All three Republicans have tried to link the popular Brown to President Biden, the unpopular incumbent.

This race marks Mr. Brown’s first run in a presidential year since the state put Republicans on top. The last time he stood next to a Democratic president was in 2012, when President Barack Obama won the state by three points.

But Mr. Biden’s approval ratings in Ohio are gloomyand the eventual Republican Senate nominee is expected to face this reality.

All three candidates simultaneously criticized “Biden and Brown” or “Brown and Biden,” whether discussing the border crisis, claiming they oppose American energy or criticizing their support for the Inflation Reduction Act.

But for now, much of their focus is on attacking each other, even on topics where there is little daylight between them.