Republican Ohio Senate candidate and businessman Bernie Moreno, a Trump loyalist challenging incumbent Democrat Sen. Sherrod Brown, has spent a good part of his campaign walking back his onetime support of the LGBTQ+ community, looking to appease the basest of the Buckeye State’s MAGA base.
Recently he’s immediately walked back his commitment to answer “tough questions” from reporters just moments after saying he welcomed them.
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Holding court with reporters down the hall from Brown’s Senate office Moreno said, “I can tell you this: If I’m here, I will talk to you at any point in time, even take tough questions. If you can’t come out here and address the media and talk to reporters and give your position and be unequivocal and clear, then you have no business being in elected office.”
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“We need people who are clear and transparent,” Moreno continued. “Sometimes, by the way, it means you’re going to be controversial, and you’re going to say something that not everybody agrees on, but that’s what you owe your voters.”
Outside Sen Brown’s office this morning, his GOP opponent, Bernie Moreno, gaggles with reporters, saying, “I can tell you this, if I’m here, I will talk to you at any point in time, even take tough questions. Sherrod Brown won’t do that.”
A reporter immediately asked, “You said earlier this week that you support some restrictions on abortion after 15 weeks. Do you think that contradicts what the party’s new platform and position is on this issue?”
Without missing a beat, Moreno responded, “We’re not here to talk about abortion.”
“My position on abortion is crystal, crystal clear. It has not changed on abortion. You’re gonna see Democrats pull out everything they’ve got to change the subject,” which was precisely what Moreno was doing in that moment.
Republicans worry that GOP opposition to abortion could bring more pro-choice Democratic voters to the polls in the 2024 general elections. Since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, voters in seven states have supported ballot measures strengthening abortion access, even in conservative states like Kansas, Kentucky, and Ohio. Similar measures will be on the November ballots in Colorado, Florida, Maryland, and South Dakota, all of which could help bring out Democratic voters to oppose former President Donald Trump and other Republican candidates.
Moreno also backtracks on past support of LGBTQ+ rights
Moreno’s other forgotten commitments include a meeting he had with Equality Ohio in support of a business coalition opposed to LGBTQ+ discrimination in the state. He also recently claimed to be unfamiliar with the Ohio Fairness Act which that coalition helped write.
Moreno recently accused LGBTQ+ rights advocates of pushing a “radical” agenda of “indoctrination,” criticized a GOP primary opponent of being untrustworthy because he was “pro-trans,” attacked Republican Gov. Mike DeWine’s veto of a state bill banning any health care for transgender youth, opposed the federal LGBTQ+ non-discrimination lbill called The Equality Act, and asserted “biological men can’t play women’s sports” while misgendering trans female athletes in the process.
Moreno’s Collection Auto Group company was a sponsor of the Gay Games in Cleveland in 2014, and the candidate has shared that his oldest son is gay.
Shortly before winning the Ohio GOP primary in March, accusations surfaced that Moreno had uploaded a profile seeking “Men for 1-on-1 sex” on the sex app Adult Friend Finder in 2008. A former intern and friend of the candidate, Dan Ricci, said he created the account as “part of a juvenile prank.”
Moreno has declared himself, “Absolutely pro-life, no exceptions.”
