Ohio's highly anticipated Senate race has long been rated a toss-up as incumbent Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown and Donald Trump-backed challenger Bernie Moreno ping-ponged a roughly two-point lead over the last six weeks. Recent poll averages still place odds ever so slightly in progressive Brown's favor on the eve of Election Day — driven in large part by Ohio women.
The contentious race has been a statistical dead-heat for weeks, with either candidate's hair-thin lead falling within each poll's margin of error, which is typically around 3%. That hasn't changed at the eleventh hour. The Cook Political Report still rates the Ohio Senate race a "toss-up," while the FiveThirtyEight polling average notches a 1.2-point lead for Brown as of Nov. 3. But as time before the election has narrowed, so too has the gap between former luxury car salesman Moreno and the three-term United States senator, who is relying on GOP ticket splitters to secure a win.
"The outcome of the race will dictate a good deal about how competitive Ohio will likely be between Democrats and Republicans moving forward," said Robert Alexander, the founding director of Bowling Green State University's Democracy and Public Policy Research Network in Ohio.
"A Moreno win would likely mean Ohio could be drifting rightward for some time," Alexander told Salon in an email. "A robust Brown victory would give Democrats hope that they can be competitive in the state in upcoming elections."
Polls have returned leads for both candidates among Ohio voters in the weeks leading up to the election. The BGSU Democracy and Public Policy Research Network's October survey of 1,000 likely Ohio voters found Brown had a slight edge over Moreno, 47% to 45%. That poll, which has a 3.6% margin of error, was conducted Oct. 10-21. Meanwhile, a Morning Consult poll of 1,254 likely voters, conducted between Oct. 23 and Nov. 1, showed Moreno leading Brown by one point, 47% to 46%. That survey's margin of error is 3%.
Another recent poll from the Ray C. Bliss Institute of Applied Politics at the University of Akron in Ohio showed Brown with a two-point lead over Moreno, notching 46% support to Moreno's 44%. It also saw Trump leading Democratic candidate and Vice President Kamala Harris by seven points among Ohio voters, 51% to 44%. The poll, conducted between Sept. 12 and Oct. 24, surveyed 1,241 registered Ohio voters pulled from the state's voter database.
While Brown's lead remains within the poll's 2.8% margin of error, J. Cherie Strachan, the director of the Ray C. Bliss Institute, told Salon it suggests Ohioans are willing to split their tickets to elect him despite high partisan polarization.
"It's clear that at least a handful of people are planning at this point, to either split their ticket or just not vote in the Senate race," she said in a phone interview. "That support is coming from people who are going to vote for Trump — not a huge number, but enough to keep Brown in the race. At least men are saying, 'I'm going to vote for Brown instead,' and that drops off Moreno's support a little bit. But for women, they're just saying, I'm not voting for either one of them, or I'm not voting at all."
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Also of note, Strachan said, was the difference in Ohioans' support for Trump compared to Moreno by gender — especially among women. In a highly polarized political landscape characterized, in part, by a national decline in split-ticket voting, one would expect the percentage of voters declaring their backing of the Republican presidential candidate to reasonably match with that of the Republican senatorial candidate, she explained. That was not the case here.
Fifty-three percent of polled men said they were voting for Trump, while only 49% said they'd be voting for Moreno. Brown received 44% support from male respondents compared to the 41% who said they were backing Harris. This dynamic was far more pronounced among women voters, among whom Trump led by a single point, 49% to Harris' 48%.
While 48% of women surveyed indicated they'd be casting a vote for Brown, only 40% of women said they'd vote for Moreno. Another 12% of surveyed women said they weren't supporting either Senate candidate, compared to the 3% who said they weren't supporting either presidential candidate.
Strachan speculated that the split between support for Trump and support for Moreno among women surveyed could be indicative of the car dealer hemorrhaging support in the aftermath of his now-viral, controversial comments in September, calling it "a little crazy" for Ohio women to heavily weigh abortion access when casting their ballots.
"Women are withholding their support more than men from Moreno," she said, adding: "It strikes me that women, interestingly, are holding Moreno more accountable for that negative commentary about women or reproductive rights issues than they are Trump — perhaps because of that video in particular, or that it creates some scrutiny [and] raised their attention to that issue in relationship to the Senate race."
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Brown and Moreno's face-off has become the most expensive congressional race in U.S. history, according to AdImpact data reported by NBC News, nearing $500 million in ad spending or reservations as of Oct. 31. The Ohio Senate race is crucial to determining which party will assume control of the upper chamber in the next term.
Democrats this election cycle are aiming to retain control over the Senate, a task made harder by independent Sen. Joe Manchin's retirement in West Virginia, whose open seat is expected to flip. With Democratic Montana Sen. John Tester's race leaning Republican, the party is banking on incumbent Sens. Brown, Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., and Bob Casey Jr., D-Pa., claiming victories on Nov. 5 in their toss-up races as well as successfully filling the open seat in Michigan.
Alexander said that Democrats have "a great deal riding on this contest" as they need a Brown win to have a chance at maintaining their Senate majority, though his victory would by no means be a guarantee.
"The chances that Democrats can hold on to the Senate would likely end if Brown lost," he added. "At the same time, if he has a strong showing, it could give Democrats hope not only in keeping the Senate, but perhaps portend positive outcomes in House races and even the presidential election. The outcome of the race will be spun in multiple directions given its implications not only in Ohio but for the nation."
Often described as fighting for his political life, Brown has faced an uphill battle this election cycle. The gravelly-voiced Clevelander is one of the only statewide Democratic elected officials Ohio has left, and he's running for re-election in a political landscape that has twice voted for Donald Trump with an eight-point margin.
Experts have told Salon that a large part of what has made this race a "toss-up" instead of a "lean-Republican" is Brown's popularity and name recognition in the state as one of the last true retail politicians. Political newcomer Moreno's lack of name recognition, despite having Trump's endorsement, also works in Brown's favor.
Moreno, a Columbian-American businessman and former Mercedes dealer in Cleveland, has worked to increase his name identification in the state through a bevy of ads and campaign stops. Originally a critic of the former president, Moreno has since glued himself to Trump and the GOP's policies and campaigned, in part, on being a political newcomer with an aspirational immigration story.
Strachan said that in the final moments of the Senate race, she expects the candidates to continue making plays toward voters who are undecided or not expressing interest in either candidate, like the 33% of Independents or 12% of women surveyed in the Bliss Institute's poll.
"There's still movement out there," she said. "If you could lock down some of the potential voters who are registered, who are saying, 'I haven't decided yet,' or 'I'm alienated from both candidates,' I think you would see them both, up until the very end, trying to flip those voters and turn them out — tooth and nail to the end."
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