The Cleveland.com/Plain Dealer editorial board is endorsing Tim Ryan in the Democratic primary for Ohio’s open U.S. Senate seat, calling him the “superior choice for Democrats in this race,” and highlighting his “unbeaten track record of success at the polls” and his “commitment to workers, organized labor and the middle class.”
Read the highlights of today’s endorsement:
- …it is Ryan, 48, who grew up in Niles and [experienced] both the Mahoning Valley’s painful manufacturing retrenchments and its current hopes to become the “Voltage Valley,” who is the superior choice for Democrats in this race. That’s not least because Ryan has an unbeaten track record of success at the polls, having easily won 10 elections in two different congressional districts surrounding the Youngstown/Warren area beginning in 2002, plus one for state senator in 2000.
- Ryan says that his primary motivation to run for a Senate seat is that he has become frustrated with the failure of the Senate to act on bills that he believes are critical for the country, but that come out of the House and go nowhere.
- “The Senate is where the action is,” he said as the three candidates participated in an endorsement interview with members of The Plain Dealer and cleveland.com editorial board. “We’ve passed so many bills through the House on multiple issues that go to the Senate and they die there. I want to get to the Senate, pass filibuster reform, and then be able to pass these things that have made it through the House and will make this a more perfect union.”
- Ryan wants to concentrate on economic reform, health care, taking care of the Great Lakes and education, among other issues, but the one thing that has marked his career from the start has been his commitment to workers, organized labor and the middle class.
- “I am running for the U.S. Senate to cut Ohio workers in on the deal,” he said. “Ohioans are working longer and harder than ever before, and still falling further behind, while too many in Washington are disconnected from the challenges at hand and instead want to wage culture wars and sow discord and division.”
- He also touts his ability to work across the aisle, referring to his good working relationship with Geauga County Republican U.S. Rep. Dave Joyce, among others, and his standing as Ohio’s most bipartisan Democratic member of Congress, according to 2019-2020 rankings from the Lugar Center and Georgetown University’s McCourt School.
- Both Morgan Harper and Traci TJ Johnson are committed and worthy candidates, but it is Tim Ryan who is the best choice for Ohio Democrats in the May 3 primary for U.S. Senate.
Original source can be found here
