They hold the key to Senate control — but they'd rather talk about Montana and Ohio

Jon Tester and Sherrod Brown hold the keys to the Senate Democratic majority. Their political survival may rest on voters not seeing them that way.

Thanks to the retirement of Joe Manchin, which followed years of other Democratic defeats and retirements in red and purple states, the genial Montanan and fiery Ohioan are the linchpins of Democrats’ long-shot bid to keep the Senate this fall.

Both Tester’s and Brown’s prospects essentially hinge on how successfully they can emphasize local investments they helped secure in Democrats’ big bills and their representation of their own constituents — rather than their key roles in determining who runs the Senate next year. Republicans will do everything they can to focus on the latter, and engaging on that message does Brown and Tester no good in their red states.

“That’s what people tell me,” Tester said in an interview, when asked about his race’s national importance. "But I don’t view it that way.”

For now, Democrats feel the rough Ohio GOP primary delivered them a more favorable result than Montana will. Donald Trump-backed Bernie Moreno won Ohio’s Republican contest this week, giving Brown a general-election foe who his party saw as preferable to the race’s other two candidates.

Democrats had hoped a difficult internecine battle would materialize in Montana, by contrast, but Republicans, led by Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.), defused a potentially tough primary and anointed Tim Sheehy to take on Tester.

Over the next seven months, Brown and Tester will have to convince voters that they represent their red states better than Republican opponents could. That will mean finding novel ways to serve their voters and trying to disqualify their challengers, but also keeping distance from the national party. Several examples are already coming into play, including Tester's Senate-passed effort to block the Biden administration's plan to import beef from Paraguay and Brown's rail safety bill.

Which helps explain why, when asked if it was important to keep the Senate under Democratic control, Tester replied: “It's more important to have good honest leadership from Montana in the United States Senate. I don't think you'll get that with a newly minted millionaire moving to the state that thinks they’re Montana.”

In a separate interview, Brown cast Moreno as unlikely to find the bipartisan opportunities he’s carved out, touting his own constituent service and criticizing Moreno’s “arrogant” stance on abortion.

Brown also predicted that GOP attempts to cast him as the deciding vote for Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and President Joe Biden won’t work in Ohio — once the pre-eminent swing state, now reliably red.

“Most people aren’t that partisan. Some are; They don’t vote for me, I understand that,” Brown said. He estimated that’s a minority of his voters.

In a sign that early March is already starting to feel like fall in the Senate’s top races, Moreno joined the Republicans' weekly lunch on Thursday. He even walked past Brown on his way up to the second floor of the Capitol.

With the help of Trump and Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio), Moreno powered through the primary despite a flurry of last-minute attacks on him. Still, two Democratic senators said this week they think Brown has a better chance against Moreno than his primary rivals, a sentiment backed up by Democratic spending meant to boost Moreno down the stretch.

One big asset for Moreno: The undeniable reality that no Democrat would have an easy time in an Ohio Senate race, particularly in a presidential election year. In an interview during his Washington visit, Moreno indicated that he’s eager to nationalize the race to tank Brown’s appeal across the aisle.

“He's never had to run in a presidential year where the top of the ticket of his party is deeply unpopular, which is what he's got right now,” Moreno said of Brown. “If Air Force One flies over Ohio, Sherrod Brown is going to hide in his basement and pretend he doesn't even see the plane.”

Further west, Democrats think that Sheehy, a veteran and entrepreneur originally from Minnesota, is as sharp a contrast to Tester as the wealthy businessman Moreno is to Brown. Still, most Republicans consider Sheehy to be a big upgrade over Rep. Matt Rosendale (R-Mont.), who briefly pursued a run despite his thick Maryland accent and 2018 loss to Tester.

Tester’s big challenge this fall will be getting an even higher percentage of ticket-splitters to come his way in a state where Trump is expected to win easily. Trump’s 16-point win in Montana in 2020 was enough to sink popular former Democrat Gov. Steve Bullock, even though Bullock outperformed Biden by 6 points.

It’s not impossible — GOP Sen. Susan Collins did it in Maine in 2020 — but it will be a far harder task than he faced in his 2018 win over Rosendale. As Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) put it: “They will be nationalized races, whether the Democrats want it or not.”

“The Republican Senate majority runs through Montana,” said Katie Martin, a spokesperson for Sheehy. “While in previous cycles Tester has benefited from weak candidates or a national climate favorable to Democrats, that is not the case with a Trump-Sheehy ticket in 2024.”

Ohio has gone red since Trump first ran in 2016, but to a lesser degree than Montana. Trump won the state by 8 points and Vance won his campaign against former Democratic Rep. Tim Ryan by 6 points.

Both Brown and Tester won in 2012 alongside then-President Barack Obama, with Tester handily outperforming the former president and both Brown and Obama winning Ohio. Both senators again over-performed in the 2018 midterms.

“It’s my job to worry. In states that Trump carried so heavily, it’s particularly concerning,” said Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the party whip. “But these are two extraordinary candidates.”

For Republicans, the two states stick out: Even if Biden wins reelection as Trump falters in swing states, Montana and Ohio are still eminently winnable for their Senate candidates. Other critical Senate races in Pennsylvania, Nevada, Michigan, Arizona and Wisconsin will follow the presidential race far more closely than Tester and Brown's states, though Democrats hope that the same partisan bias their incumbents face also works against Larry Hogan in Maryland.

Democrats are also preparing to mount challenges to Sens. Rick Scott of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas, but those are uphill battles at the moment.

Which makes Ohio and Montana so significant, given Democrats’ 51-49 majority. With Manchin retiring in West Virginia and Democrats almost certain to lose a seat there, they probably need to run the table by holding onto all their incumbents.

“It’s a challenge. But both Sherrod and Tester have shown a unique ability to run ahead of a Democratic ticket in a presidential year,” said Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.). “I tell you, I would not bet money against those guys.”