On Monday morning, Secretary of State Frank LaRose made it official over that he is running for the U.S. Senate in Ohio. He had indicated the night before that he had an announcement to make, which came after months of teasing about such a run.
The campaign announcement, slightly over a minute long, features LaRose going for a run as the Ohio native lists out the concerns he has with this country, but how he's "on a mission to give back to the state that has given me so much" so as "to continue to serve the country I love and protect the values we share."
The ad concludes with him meeting his family at the end of the run, with one of his daughters saying "see, mommy, I told you daddy was running."
It's official: I'm running. pic.twitter.com/YEs89T9uU4
— Frank LaRose (@FrankLaRose) July 17, 2023
LaRose joins a Republican primary where businessman Bernie Moreno and state Sen. Matt Dolan have already declared. The race is particularly one to watch, since the winning candidate will go on to challenge Sen. Sherrod Brown, Ohio's vulnerable Democratic incumbent. Other than state Supreme Court justices, he is the only Democratic official in a state that's become increasingly red.
In highlighting LaRose's candidacy, and the state of the race, a POLITICO report on "Ohio’s messy GOP Senate primary gets a third candidate" noted that "Dolan and Moreno are both self-funders likely to inject millions into their primary campaigns."
LaRose, however, argued that his name ID will help him in the race. As he told POLITICO:
“I feel that I’ve got the strongest shot of being able to defeat Sherrod Brown,” LaRose, a Green Beret who’s currently a reservist, said last week in the lobby of the Grand Hyatt hotel in Washington, D.C. “We need a candidate who has strong statewide name ID. I’m the only one that has that.”
LaRose then took direct aim at his two opponents: “They’ve been prosperous in their lives, and we congratulate them for that. But that doesn’t make you necessarily a good public servant or a good Senate candidate or a good senator.”
Back in May, before LaRose was an official candidate, Tom Zawistowski, president of the tea party-affiliated We the People Convention, spoke to American Family News about the difficulties of beating an incumbent, and how important it was for the nominee to have name recognition.
"You have Frank LaRose, who's our secretary of state, who has won state races twice, who will probably have the least money, but he has name recognition of like 85%," Zawistowski said. "The odds are that the only person who could beat Sherrod Brown is Frank LaRose."
Polls, including from those conducted by the Louisiana-based Causeway Solutions for Leadership for Ohio Fund, show Ohioans to be largely undecided, but that LaRose enjoys more support than other candidates. The group has supported LaRose's work as secretary of state, a role he has used to defend election integrity. LaRose has also raised money for the group, the Columbus Dispatch reported.
An East Carolina University poll conducted last month also showed that Ohioans are mostly undecided, but that LaRose has 17 percent support in a hypothetical primary, compared to Dolan's 14 percent and Moreno's 7 percent.
That poll also shows Brown leading Dolan by 45 to 44 percent, while the incumbent leads LaRose by 44 to 42 percent. Brown leads Moreno by 46 to 42 percent.
The poll's write-up quoted Jonathan Morris, Senior Polling Scientist for the Center for Survey Research, in highlighting the importance of this particular race. "Although Ohio has shifted much more in favor of Republicans over the last decade, Sherrod Brown still has enough state-wide appeal to make this a very close general election. We suspect all eyes will be on this contest as it very well could determine control of the United States Senate in November 2024," Morris said.
LaRose handily won reelection last November by 20 points, and was the only sitting Secretary of State to be endorsed by former and potentially future President Donald Trump.
Trump also has noticed Moreno's campaign though, which he spoke about on TruthSocial. Moreno is the father-in-law of Rep. Max Miller, who is a Trump-endorsed congressman who served as a former aide to the president. He currently represents Ohio's 7th Congressional District.
Both Moreno and Dolan ran in the Republican primary to replace retiring Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH), though Moreno dropped out. Dolan finished third in last year's Republican primary, closely behind former Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel. Mainstream media outlets saw that as a bonus for Dolan, though evidently, the Ohio voters did not.
Now Sen. JD Vance (R-OH) won that primary and has endorsed Moreno for this race.
While Ohio is certainly a state to watch in a year where the Senate map looks to be very favorable to Republicans, Chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) Steve Daines (R-MT) has full faith in each of the candidates. As Daines told CBS News last week, at which point it was assumed that LaRose would enter the race, the NRSC is staying neutral in this particular primary, since he believes any one of them could beat Brown. They "don't stay up late worrying about that" race, as Daines explained.