Sherrod Brown’s Phony Populism

Polling shows that former Democrat Senator Sherrod Brown is in a dead heat with incumbent Republican Jon Husted in Ohio’s marquee Senate race. Like his previous campaigns, Brown is betting the house on a message of economic populism while avoiding the radical positions on social issues that have made the Democrat brand toxic in the state.

But Ohio voters should understand that Brown is hardly the pragmatic moderate he presents himself as – and he is responsible for the very economic anxieties that he is now looking to capitalize on.

Brown’s campaign website calls him a “champion for workers and the middle class” who “has advocated for Ohio and for ordinary people.” During rallies throughout the state, he has bragged about his work with President Trump on trade policy and a 2018 bill, the Interdict Act, to crack down on fentanyl trafficking. He has claimed that he supports “closing the border” and tapped into simmering voter anger over the rapid growth of the data center industry.

To hear Brown tell it, he’s working day and night to deliver for the same working-class constituency that turned Ohio from a perennial swing state into safe Trump territory.