2026 Ohio U.S. Senate Race: Full interview with Sherrod Brown

[00:00:00] Sherry Brown: I've been a healthy skeptic of corporate power in this country because corporate power is really why this system is so rigged and people recognize it. Overwhelmingly people, it doesn't matter their political party, they recognize corporate power has made their lives [00:00:14] Speaker 2: harder. Thank you very much, Sherry Brown, for talking with us today. We appreciate it. First question, obviously affordability, the economy, a major issue in this race. If voters do send you back to DC, what is the first thing you'll do in the Senate to [00:00:29] Sherry Brown: lower cost for Ohio families? Well, first thing you do is fight to end the war. Second thing you do is fight to end the terrorists. I mean, look what's happened with prices since the attack on Iran. I spoke with a farmer in Northwest Ohio who's paying $100,000 more for fertilizer because of this war than he did a year ago. That's essentially the profit for his family farm. They know diesel prices have doubled for truckers and farmers. We know what gas prices have done. We know what happened with food prices. And most of that's because of the war and because of the tariffs. And John Husted's voted for the war literally 14 times. He's voted against getting rid of the tariffs like a half dozen times. And if we're going to get serious, I mean, it's a question of who you're representing. And John Husted was a special interest guy in Columbus supporting First Energy and the insurance companies. Now he's a special guy interest guy in Washington supporting the oil industry and Wall Street. And that's what this election's about. The system's rigged. And voters voters can choose between the guy that's really in Ohio responsible for this rigged system or a guy that's going to take them on. What you just said is a key [00:01:42] Speaker 2: phrase kind of in bold type on your website. The system is rigged. We're fighting to fix it. Critics of you getting back in this race trying to get back in the Senate. We'll point out you have held an elective office for almost 50 years, 32 years of that in Congress. If the system is rigged, haven't you had a chance to fix it? [00:02:04] Sherry Brown: Well, I've built a career around taking holding the drug companies responsible. We were able to put a cap on insulin, for instance, at $35 for people in Medicare. I've built a career about holding Wall Street accountable. I was the most outspoken person against these awful trade agreements that have cost us jobs. When you take on these interest groups, you don't win every time. But you can choose between a guy who's part of that. John Husted's been part of this rigged system, took over $100,000 from an Epstein co-conspirator, then voted only a few weeks later to keep the files closed. You could see he voted against putting a cap on insurance rates while taking $700,000 from insurance companies. So if you take on the rigged system, you don't always win. In fact, it's hard to win when you're taking on the billionaires in Wall Street and the drug companies and the oil companies. People know I will make that fight. People know John Husted is their boy. Other than ending the war in Iran, [00:03:11] Speaker 2: that's a huge task at this point. What would you do specifically? What would you propose in the Senate that would benefit Ohio families with their economic situation? [00:03:19] Sherry Brown: You eliminate the tariffs. We know that the tariffs have cost Ohio soybean farmers their markets in China. We know the tariffs are why a restaurant can't invest in a new coffee maker or a farmer can't buy a new combine or even afford spare parts. We know tariffs have caused everybody's prices to go up to the grocery store. So the focus needs have been fight to end the war, fight to end the tariffs, and then go after the corruption. I mean, look at the corruption in state government where John Husted was in the middle of this. He testified in behalf of the people who gave the bribe, a $61 million bribe. That's why electric rates have gone up dramatically. We have some of the highest electric rates in the country. That's because of First Energy and John Husted's connection to them, and it's because of the data centers. Senator Husted, not a senator at that point, lieutenant governor, delivered on $2.5 billion of Ohio taxpayer money to go to these data centers, 225 of them now in Ohio and growing. These data centers come in, they swallow up the land, they drink up the water, they listen to no local input, and then electric rates go up. So this rig system takes a lot of different forms, and what's happened with data centers is a big, big part of that. Do you support data centers? Yes or no? No. Well, I said what you need to do is you need to cap electric rates. I mean, 225 of them are already built or being built. You cap electric rates, you make sure that they don't get these tax breaks. I mean, the fact that Ohioans have given $2.5 billion of our tax dollars to these billionaires, the data centers, the crypto crowd, the people that, the billionaires that certainly don't need this money, and then the local people have no say over it. I mean, that tells you what we're up against, but they shouldn't get the tax breaks. They ought to have local input, people in their communities, and we've got to cap electric rate, so that they can't slough off the electricity cost increases to Ohioans. Your campaign website does [00:05:34] Speaker 2: say data centers, as you've mentioned, should pay the full cost of their utility needs. What specific federal action do you see taking to make that a reality? Well, you pass a law saying these data [00:05:47] Sherry Brown: centers, they cannot charge taxpayers for their electricity, period. Do you think that's really [00:05:54] Speaker 2: something that can happen? Oh yeah, absolutely it can. Should the decision on whether or not data centers come to a community, should that be something that Congress should be involved in? Should it be the state? Should it be these local communities making the decisions? Well, it should mostly be local [00:06:11] Sherry Brown: communities. I mean, I talk to people all over. I've been in Chillicothe and Jackson the last couple days. I'm going to Steubenville. I'm going to Cleveland in a couple of days, and going to Akron. So I'm everywhere, and I hear the anger about data centers from people in both parties. The politics of it is simply not there in terms of partisan differences, and they all feel like they had no say. And in affluent communities and poor communities in rural Ohio and medium-sized city Ohio, they feel like they've had no say. And it was, it really was thrust on them. They get these tax dollars, they get, they get an infusion of tax breaks, tax dollars. They then go on these people, you know, I think people, Mike, didn't even know what data centers were three and four years ago. And all of a sudden they see these. I was in Bowling Green one day, and Bowling Green, that part of the state is very flat. And I come around to Bend, and all of a sudden I see all these cranes, and they're building a 280-acre data center. And I worked on a family farm, and I have a concept of what a 10-acre field is in north central Ohio, because I bailed hay in a 10-acre field. And to think of that 28 times larger is sort of mind-boggling. You come around and you see these cranes, you see all these trucks, and you know, farmers nearby didn't ask for this. And there was no, there were no town halls, there were no meetings, there was no input. It was just the companies come in, they collect their tax breaks, and they then tried to charge us for the electricity. And they jeopardized the local water system. [00:07:44] Speaker 2: In 2015, there was news of an Amazon data center coming to New Albany. Your office in the Senate put out a release that said, quote, "This new data center is great news for New Albany and central Ohio." How has your position on data centers changed since then? Well, that was one data center that was [00:08:08] Sherry Brown: discussed in the local community. I mean, John, there's no comparison. John Husted has been called by people in your profession, the face of data centers. There's 226 of them. People had no input, they didn't know what they were initially. Most people- Should they be being built in Ohio, though? Should these be being built in Ohio? They should. That's a question for local communities and the state. And when you give two and a half billion dollars in tax breaks, they shouldn't have these tax breaks. They ought to be able to say this. I'd look at anything that comes into a community, the community ought to have a say about it through its village or city council, through its county commissioners, through town hall meetings. There was essentially none of that as these data center, these billionaires in places like mostly California, that these investors came in, collected their money, built these data centers, and then they're trying to charge us for electric rates. I mean, electric bills, it's clearly a rigged system run amok, even more rigged than usual. [00:09:15] Speaker 2: So why should Congress be involved in it if this is something that should be decided at the state and [00:09:19] Sherry Brown: local level? Well, partly because the state legislature is so corrupt that they don't mind. You know, they gave, in addition to that, more recently, the state legislature gave $600 million to a Tennessee billionaire to build a new Cleveland Brown stadium. $600 million of taxpayer dollars to build a billionaire stadium. I mean, that kind of thing is, I mean, I'm not running for governor and I'm not spending a lot of time talking about the legislature, but that kind of corruption. John Husted's been part of that his whole career in state government, now in the federal government, on data centers, on First Energy, where the executives gave a $61 million bribe. John Husted was in the middle of that. Some of the executives called him our golden boy because he took care of them. So, I mean, this corruption, this corruption cause, it's not just wrong. It's not just the fact that the average CEO makes 300 times what the average worker makes. Also, it means higher prices. It means local communities don't get a chance to have input into these community decisions. And that's all part of the corruption. It's all over [00:10:28] Speaker 2: the state and federal government now. I want to be respectful of your time. I know you have somewhere else to be, but I just want to try to become clear on you with this issue. Do you see any benefit to data centers? Are they inherently something that we need? [00:10:45] Sherry Brown: I think it's up to local communities. Yeah, I think that, I mean, we've got to, we've got to produce what we need to produce. And we also have to have more rules about AI and where that all goes. But again, like I said, it's a lot of different ways. Mike, I want local communities to decide this. I, you know, I've always been a healthy, you know, my career, I've always been a healthy skeptic of corporate power. And when I see these data centers, when I see what so many companies have come in, and I mean, I look at, look at, look at, look at Wall Street and what they've done with trade agreements. Look at the drug companies and how they, they've continued to overcharge people. Look at the oil company reaping hundreds of billions of dollars of profit while Americans are getting screwed by the mistakes in this war in Iran. So I think you start any of your questions. I should start with, I've been a healthy skeptic of corporate power in this country, because corporate power is really why this system is so rigged. And people recognize that overwhelmingly people, doesn't matter their political party, they recognize corporate power has made their lives harder. And they, they can't get ahead. They see, they see executive making more money. They see stock buybacks. They see executive bonuses. They work harder than ever before. They're more productive, yet more money goes out the door than coming in. Why is that? It's because of corporate power that continues to make their lives harder. [00:12:12] Speaker 2: My last question for you here. And I, I know the, the pushback for this can be, well, John Husted has voted with the GOP and with Trump 100% of the time. Your critics will say that you voted with the Biden administration and the Democratic Party just as often, if not more. So my, my question really is this one. What is one issue that you would be willing to break away from your party with and vote against it if it was good for Ohio? In other words, what would you be willing to do for Ohio that may go against [00:12:44] Sherry Brown: what other Democrats in the Senate would do? Well, I've established that when I've taken on presidents, all three Democratic presidents I serve with, I've taken on presidents on trade agreements. When these trade agreements have done great damage to our cities and our state, our medium side, they not just big cities. I was in Chillicothe recently in Jackson, and I know what these trade agreements have done to those communities I've broken with my president. I always will in that issue. And that's a big, big issue in people's lives. So I've proven that. John Husted has gone along when every major, every major issue with this president, with the president and the big ones like the war and over and he's had over and over a chance to, um, to break with the president hasn't [00:13:27] Speaker 2: done it. Is there anything else that you want to talk about or something you want to clarify or what'd we miss? No, I did everything. Appreciate that. Yep. Thanks, Mike. Hey, thank you. Appreciate it.