Democrats’ marquee Ohio race is the quest by three-term U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, a Cleveland Democrat, for a fourth term. Brown’s Republican challenger is Greater Cleveland entrepreneur Bernie Moreno.
The Brown-Moreno contest is already red hot, and sure to get hotter, because for Democrats, holding Brown’s seat is essential to maintaining Democrats’ U.S. Senate majority.
Be it noted that a Trump win in Ohio doesn’t necessarily guarantee Democrat Brown’s defeat and Republican Moreno’s victory. In 1988, an incumbent Democratic U.S. senator from Ohio, Howard M. Metzenbaum, of Greater Cleveland, a full-throttle liberal, won reelection with 57% of the statewide vote, besting his GOP challenger, then-Cleveland Mayor George Voinovich.
Meanwhile, Ohio voters statewide backed GOP presidential nominee George H.W. Bush, who drew 55% of Ohio’s vote to 44% cast for Democrat Michael Dukakis. And Bush captured the White House.
Although some Buckeye State bystanders might scoff at the comparison, Ohio Democrats also are waging campaigns arguably as critical as Brown’s in the three statewide contests for Ohio Supreme Court seats that are also on November’s ballot.
The seven-justice court is now composed of four Republicans and three Democrats. On the general election ballot are the seats of two Democratic justices and an open seat held by a Republican.
One of the two Democrats seeking re-election to the high court is Justice Michael P. Donnelly, a Greater Clevelander. Donnelly’s GOP challenger is Hamilton County Common Pleas Judge Megan E. Shanahan.
The other Democrat seeking re-election to the state Supreme Court is Justice Melody J. Stewart, also a Greater Clevelander. Stewart is being challenged by another justice already on the court, Republican Justice Joseph T. Deters, once Hamilton County’s prosecuting attorney, earlier Ohio’s state treasurer, and a close ally of GOP Gov. Mike DeWine.
The third Supreme Court matchup on Ohio’s November ballot (for the seat that the GOP’s Deters now holds) is between a Greater Cleveland Democrat, Judge
Lisa Forbes, of the Ohio Court of Appeals (8th District), and a Columbus Republican, Judge Dan Hawkins, of Franklin County Common Pleas Court.
Although Ohio’s Supreme Court is less visible than the U.S. Supreme Court, Ohio’s highest court has an enormous role in Ohioans’ lives, not only in occasionally offsetting Ohio’s powerful executive branch, and Ohio’s grossly partisan General Assembly, but also because of the Supreme Court’s power to rein in rate increases the pro-utility Public Utilities Commission of Ohio sets.
The court, as noted, is 4-3 Republican. If Donnelly and Stewart win, and Forbes bests Hawkins, that, with Brunner would make the court 4-3 Democratic.
And the court’s 2025 caseload could be crucial: It’s likely to include challenges to Ohioans’ statewide 2023 vote to guarantee a right to abortion, and GOP moves to gut a pending voter-initiated anti-gerrymandering plan.
If, despite Trump’s perceived strength in Ohio, Democrats and independents do turn out on Election Day, they’d have a good shot at deciding the (Democrat) Brown vs. (Republican) Moreno and Supreme Court contests.
Meanwhile, nattering Democrats inside Washington’s Beltway will likely still be checking weathervanes to see which way the wind is blowing.
Thomas Suddes is a former legislative reporter with The Plain Dealer in Cleveland and writes from Ohio University. You can reach him at tsuddes@gmail.com.
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