Story and Video: Ohio Senate Candidate Brown Meets Supporters in Martins Ferry
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MARTINS FERRY -- Sherrod Brown shared his message that the system is rigged, the war in Iran is continuing to drive up prices and his opponent in Ohio’s Senate race is a “special interest guy” with supporters from across the region during a meet-and-greet session Thursday afternoon.
“The system’s rigged, and you can see what’s happening,” Brown said while speaking at USW Local 1238 in Martins Ferry. “You can talk about drug costs. You can talk about data centers. You can talk about Wall Street -- it’s all of the above.”
Brown is running against Republican Sen. Jon Husted in the Nov. 3 election in an attempt to return to the Senate. Brown served three terms in the Senate before losing a re-election bid to Republican Bernie Moreno in 2024. Husted and Brown are running to complete the last two years in the term of the seat that had been held by J.D. Vance before he became vice president. Husted was appointed to the Senate by Gov. Mike DeWine in January 2025.
“He was a special interest guy in Columbus, where he looked out for FirstEnergy as part of that scandal, ” Brown said of Husted, who served as lieutenant governor before being appointed to the Senate seat. “Then, of course everybody’s electricity rates went up, and he’s called the ‘golden boy’ by the executives who made the $61 million bribe to the speaker of the house and who ended up in prison.”
The FirstEnergy scandal led to former Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder being sentenced to prison. No charges have been filed against Husted in connection with the case.
“He’s always looking out for special interests. The data center crypto crowd just dropped $55 million into my race,” Brown added. “I’ve never seen anything like this year. They know he will do their bidding with everything and that he’s their guy, and they know that I am not. I will stand up for people who are getting screwed in this country. You can count on that.”
The Husted campaign disagreed with Brown’s assessment.
“Sherrod Brown spent 32 years in Washington literally building the system he now calls ‘rigged.’ Brown is backed and funded by the same people he claims to oppose -- this is just another stunning example of Sherrod Brown’s hypocrisy and the fact that he’s willing to lie to Ohio families,” Amy Natoce, a campaign spokesperson for Husted, said Thursday evening.
Natoce added during his three decades in Washington, Brown took nearly $4.9 million from Wall Street-affiliated and billionaire donors; $400,000 from insurance lobbyists and corporate PACs; $237,000 from opioid giants; and tens of thousands of dollars from data center lobbyists.
Brown said it is important to elect people who will stand up for the end of the war, stop the tariffs and take on corruption in Columbus and Washington.
He is scheduled to participate at a campaign event in Cleveland Saturday with Democrat Dr. Amy Acton, who is running for governor and Barack Obama. Brown explained while speaking with the media the former president shares his concerns about the state of the country.
“He hears the same thing I do, that people in the state see the rigged system,” Brown said. “They see people are getting a bad deal from the government and they see the corruption. They see the high prices, they see the farmers and that fertilizer prices are going up, and that gas and diesel prices are going up. They know the system is rigged against them, and he wants to help us fight back.”
He explained eliminating tax breaks and allowing local residents more say in decisions about where centers can be located is important.
“They get these tax giveaways and then electricity rates go up, they gobble up the land, they contaminate the water and then electric bills go up,” Brown said of the data centers. “So, you take away their tax breaks, you give local communities some input and you get some assurance that electric bills aren’t going up from this.”
Brown added Ohio’s recent decision to suspend the fuel tax through the end of the year is not any kind of solution for high prices. Since Oct. 4, the state has suspended the 38.5-cent-per-gallon state gasoline tax and the 47-cent-per-gallon tax on diesel fuel.
“The way to fix gasoline prices and diesel prices and fertilizer prices is to end the war,” Brown said. “Husted’s voted for the war 14 times. He says he wants to end it, but he keeps voting for it over and over and over again. The first thing you do is end the war, and then you eliminate the tariffs. That’s the reason for inflation. That’s the reason people are paying too much for gas and diesel.”
Natoce, the Husted spokesperson, pointed out “that a vote against a War Powers Resolution is not a vote for the war in Iran.”
Among the supporters in the room was John Saunders, staff representative for United Steelworkers District 1. He said the Brown-Husted battle seems close, meaning area residents have to make sure they get out and vote.
“We’re in a race,” said Saunders, who introduced Brown at the start of the event. “It’s not only to change Ohio, but it’s going to change the country. This is one of the most important, the most expensive races in the country, because it could be of the races that changes the control of the Senate. More than that, the issue is, when you look around this room, we have been working with Brown on issues that mean something for a lot of years.
“It’s hard for workers, it’s hard for labor, to walk away from someone who has a proven history of that. The country’s really struggling for leadership. I mean union or non-labor, Americans are struggling like they have never struggled before,” he added. “We all complain -- we all do. The only place I’m going to change it is at the ballot box. There’s no other way. And that’s what we’re trying to do.
Saunders added numbers from around the country show early voting totals could be heading toward record highs.
“Hopefully, that means were going to make a change,” he explained.
Brown said just by showing up at Thursday’s rally, people showed they cared.
“You could be doing whatever you want to do today,” he said. “And you continue to fight for your fellow workers, your fellow retirees, your friends, your neighbors, your kids, your grandkids. I’m in this race because I hate what has happened in my country. I hate how rigged it is. I hate how working people are getting screwed more than any time in my lifetime, and it’s getting worse, and I know that I can count on all of you to keep fighting back.
“We need you to vote early. Take your friends to vote early and make sure those votes are in,” he added.
Early voting is underway in Ohio.