GOP should back Matt Dolan for Senate

If Ohio Republicans want to fulfill their long-held dream of ousting U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Cleveland, their best bet is state Sen. Matt Dolan. Dolan, R-Chagrin Falls, is a lawyer who has proved himself effective while serving in both the Ohio House and Senate, where he is chairman of the Finance Committee. The 59-year-old Dolan, whose family owns the Cleveland Guardians, is facing off in a brutal primary against Westlake businessman Bernie Moreno, 57, and Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose, 44. A SurveyUSA poll released last week showed a tight race with Moreno holding a narrow lead with support from 29 percent of likely primary voters. Dolan came in second with 27 percent, while LaRose trailed with 21 percent. The remaining 23 percent were undecided a few weeks before the March 19 primary. Moneno lacks government experience, but his small lead can be explained in large part by former President Donald Trump's endorsement of him. Moreno dropped out of the GOP primary to replace the now-retired U.S. Sen. Rob Portman, R-Cincinnati, two years ago after a conversation with Trump. His reward appears to be the former president's backing this year. Portman's replacement, now-U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Cincinnati, won the GOP primary in 2022 thanks to Trump's endorsement. Portman, it should be noted, endorsed Dolan on Friday. We reached out to all three candidates' campaigns to schedule endorsement interviews, but only Dolan bothered to respond and sit down with us. We also endorsed Dolan in the Republican primary two years ago when he ran for Senate, finishing in third place (second in Lorain County). On the other hand, we also endorsed LaRose for reelection two years ago over a little-known Democratic challenger, concluding that he had, for the most part, managed Ohio's elections well. LaRose has made us regret that endorsement more than once in the past few years, including over his continued support for gerrymandered congressional and state legislative districts that favor Republican candidates. We also are concerned about LaRose's shift toward the election-denial wing of his party, something clearly aimed at pleasing Trump. Unlike Moreno, LaRose has never said the 2020 presidential election was stolen, as Trump and many of his supporters have falsely claimed. However, he has raised questions about election practices in other states while insisting that in Ohio it's easy to vote, but hard to cheat. LaRose is probably the best-known candidate in the race, having been both a state senator and twice winning statewide races for secretary of state. Unfortunately for LaRose, he blew a lot of his political capital trying and failing to stop voters from approving an amendment that enshrined abortion and other reproductive rights in the Ohio Constitution. (Dolan, too, opposed the measure, which passed in November. He told us he was pro-life, but supported what he called common-sense exceptions to anti-abortion laws, such as in cases of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is in danger.) Not only did LaRose oppose the abortion-rights amendment, he was one of the architects of a failed measure to make passing amendments harder. It was a cynical ploy to stop the abortion amendment. Voters rejected making the Constitution harder to amend in an expensive special election last August. Although Dolan told us that he largely supported Trump's policies and would vote for Trump if, as seems all but certain, he is the GOP nominee, he also didn't debase himself in an effort to win the former president's endorsement. Likewise, in 2022, Dolan was the only GOP candidate who flat-out rejected Trump's lies about the 2020 election being stolen and didn't pursue his endorsement. Ohio already has one senator — Vance — devoted to serving Trump's whims. It doesn't need another. Moreover, Brown has so far managed successfully to navigate Ohio's shifting political terrain, which has veered red in recent years. He won reelection to a third term in 2018 with 53.4 percent of the vote. This in a state Trump twice carried by 8 percentage points. Brown is considered among the most vulnerable Senate Democrats, but his defeat is hardly assured. Republicans should want a candidate who can compete for the middle ground rather than just play to the GOP base, as it seems likely Moreno and, to a lesser extent, LaRose would do. As Dolan correctly pointed out to us, Brown tends to run up the score in blue counties. Dolan argued that he was better positioned than his rivals to challenge Brown on his home turf in Northeast Ohio. Each of the three GOP candidates insists that he is the true conservative in the race, although the truth is that they are all conservatives. Dolan, however, has a pragmatic side that has allowed him to get things done in Columbus, including passing conservative priorities and budgets. That experience would serve him well in Washington. Dolan argued that the United States needed to take concrete steps to stem the flow of immigrants illegally crossing the southern border. For instance, when he, LaRose and Moreno appeared at the Lorain County Republican Party's Lincoln Day Dinner last week, Dolan called for closing the border. He also told us the U.S. should continue to support Ukraine's efforts to repel the unjustified Russian invasion. Dolan rightly recognized that failing to do so would only embolden Russian President Vladimir Putin and other U.S. adversaries, including China. Like Portman, Dolan would be a serious lawmaker focused on getting things done. "My focus has always been on what's best for Ohioans, what's best for Americans," Dolan told us. We disagree with many of Dolan's positions, but we agree with him that he is the Republican candidate best equipped to take on Brown in November and, if elected, to serve Ohioans.