AP file photo: Cleveland businessman and Republican Bernie Moreno campaigned in Boardman Wednesday night toward his goal of winning the Senate election in November.
Bernie Moreno, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate from Ohio, said incumbent Democrat Sherrod Brown has let Ohio down and is trying to “reinvent himself as something completely different” than he is.
“He’s a complete liar,” Moreno said of Brown on Wednesday. “He’s a fraud, he’s tired, he’s old, just like the campaign he’s running.”
Moreno, a former auto dealer and blockchain owner, is in one of the most competitive Senate races in the country against Brown, who is seeking his fourth six-year term in the Nov. 5 election.
Moreno, who began a six-day campaign tour of Ohio on Monday, was at the Mahoning County Republican Party headquarters in Boardman for a rally Wednesday night. He spoke exclusively with The Vindicator and the Tribune Chronicle ahead of the event.
Moreno, who won the three-candidate Republican primary in March, said former President Donald Trump, his party’s presidential nominee in this election, “will definitely campaign for me” in Ohio.
“I am honored that President Trump has endorsed me and that JD Vance (Ohio’s other senator and Trump’s vice presidential candidate) has endorsed me,” he said.
Moreno said that if Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential candidate, “sets foot in Ohio Territory, or (President) Joe Biden, Sherrod Brown is going to run to his basement and hide because he’s trying to convince the people of Ohio that he has nothing to do with them, when in reality he’s a liar because he voted with them and supported them almost all the time.”
Brown said he supported Harris’s candidacy for president and had publicly called on Biden two days earlier to withdraw his candidacy for re-election. However, he said he had no plans to campaign alongside Harris.
Trump, who won Ohio by about 8 percent in 2016 and 2020, is expected to win again in November. Democrats have written off Ohio, once considered a key swing state for the presidency.
Moreno is loyal to Trump, despite being critical of him in the past. Moreno has claimed in other interviews during the Senate campaign that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, a lie repeated by many Trump supporters.
During the interview on Wednesday, Moreno was asked about the 2020 elections and why he congratulated Biden on the Democrat’s victory.
Moreno said: “Every American should cheer for whoever wins the election for president of the United States. You want them to succeed. So, yes, in November 2020, I congratulated Kamala Harris and Joe Biden because you want them to succeed. Americans should want their president to succeed. Has he succeeded? Absolutely not. He was a disastrously bad president.”
Under Biden, Moreno said, the southern border is open, there has been “an attack on American energy, we have seen generations of high inflation, interest rates that are crushing working Americans, and instability around the world. Crime is rampant across the country. This country is weaker than ever because Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and Sherrod Brown have been by their side, enabling their agenda.”
Moreno did not address allegations of electoral fraud.
Trump falsely claimed on July 31 that Harris “accidentally turned black and now wants to be known as black. So, I don’t know, is she Native American or is she black?”
Harris’ mother was Indian and her father was Jamaican, and she identifies as Black and Asian American.
When asked about Trump’s statement, Moreno said: “It’s all just a diversion. I was not offended when the New York Times said, ‘I’m not Hispanic.'”
A May 12 Times article provided extensive details about Moreno’s Hispanic heritage, including his ties to Colombia, where he was born.
Moreno said Trump’s comment about Harris was “not what people care about.”
Their concerns, he said, are high grocery prices and runaway inflation.
“We should not turn this election campaign into nonsense,” said Moreno. “It’s about issues that are important to people.”
Ohioans wanted a secure border, “American dominance in energy,” the restoration of the middle class, bringing manufacturing back to the country, reducing government bureaucracy, moving federal agencies out of Washington, D.C., and giving parents responsibility for their children’s education, Moreno said.
“Let us make a political decision in this election and show why your vision for the country is different from that of your opponent, and not a policy of personal destruction,” he said.
BUSINESS NEGOTIATIONS
Moreno’s business dealings have been questioned by his two Republican challengers in the primary – Secretary of State Frank LaRose and Senator Matt Dolan – and Brown is airing ads about Moreno settling wage theft lawsuits after a Massachusetts jury ordered him to pay more than $400,000 to two former employees for failing to pay him overtime in violation of the state’s labor law.
Moreno admitted in a testimony that he destroyed paper copies of monthly reports containing overtime information, despite being told to keep all records.
Moreno said Wednesday that “Sherrod Brown’s commercial about shredding documents is completely false” and that “we did nothing wrong. We followed the law.”
Moreno also said that he does not manage payroll for his thousands of employees himself, but that it is handled by ADP, one of the largest U.S. companies by revenue.
“They did it,” Moreno said. “This is complete nonsense.”
Moreno said: “I compare my record to that of any businessman. In business, lawsuits are always going to happen. That’s what we have a court system for. Sherrod Brown must be lying about this, just like he lies about everything else.”
Moreno said he has only been sued five times in 15 years of business.
Brown’s campaign on Wednesday referred comments about Moreno to the Ohio Democratic Party.
The ODP is following Moreno’s election campaign with an inflatable “big shot” that caught the candidate’s eye.
“Sherrod Brown has to blow up stuffed animals in a parking lot because he can’t defend his record, and people don’t want to hear that,” Moreno said.
Katie Smith, a spokeswoman for the ODP, said: “Bernie Moreno has a long history of fighting for his own interests, and he’s off the hook. He steals his employees’ wages, destroys evidence, tries to avoid paying them, and lies about selling Chinese cars at the expense of Mahoning Valley workers. The people of Ohio know Moreno won’t fight for them because he’s only out for himself.”
Do you have an interesting story? Contact David Skolnick by email at [email protected]. Follow him on X, formerly Twitter, @dskolnick.
