Former Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown has told Democratic allies that he intends to run for Senate next year, two people familiar with his plans told CNN, and is soon poised to launch a 2026 campaign aimed at vindicating his defeat two years ago after three decades in Congress.
The decision to run for Senate, which Brown had quietly considered for months, adds another layer of intrigue to the Democratic Party’s uphill fight to win control of the Senate. Yet his candidacy is far from a winning bet, considering the rising GOP strength in Ohio, where Republican Sen. Jon Husted, who was appointed to the job earlier this year, faces reelection.
Brown is making good on the promise he made in his farewell speech on the Senate floor in December 2024, declaring: “It’s not, I promise you, the last time you’ll hear from me.”
The decision was first reported by Cleveland.com. An aide to Brown did not immediately return a request for comment.
Husted was appointed by Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, in January to fill the seat formerly held by Vice President JD Vance.
Prior to his 2024 defeat, Brown had a long history of winning hotly contested races in Ohio. He ousted DeWine from the Senate in 2006 and fended off stiff challenges in 2012 and 2018, even as the state shifted rightward.
A critical battleground as recently as 2012, Ohio was treated by both parties as non-competitive in the 2024 presidential race. Brown ran well ahead of the top of the Democratic ticket, losing by 3.6 percentage points while the party’s presidential nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris, lost by 11.2 points in Ohio.
Democrats need a net gain of four seats in next year’s midterm elections to win control of the Senate — a stiff challenge on a map that sees the party defending its own seats in the swing states of Georgia, Michigan and New Hampshire, with relatively few viable pick-up opportunities.
Democrats scored a recruiting coup in North Carolina, where former Gov. Roy Cooper has given the party perhaps its best chance at flipping a GOP-held Senate seat.
In addition to North Carolina and Ohio, they are hoping some combination of Maine, a blue-leaning state where Republican Sen. Susan Collins is seen as likely to run for reelection; Texas, where Sen. John Cornyn faces an already bruising primary fight against state Attorney General Ken Paxton; and Iowa, where Sen. Joni Ernst has not yet formally declared whether she is running for reelection, will emerge as competitive in the coming months.
Brown, 72, had also been considering a run for governor, with DeWine term-limited and ineligible to seek a third term.
Though the election is more than a year away, Husted and Brown are the likely nominees of their parties. National Democrats spent months trying to woo Brown into the race. And President Donald Trump endorsed Husted in April, all but closing the door to viable primary challengers.
This story has been updated with additional details.
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