Sherrod Brown

Sherrod Brown
Junior Senator, Ohio
Incumbent
Assumed office January 4, 2007– Serving with George Voinovich
Preceded by	Mike DeWine
Succeeded by	Incumbent (2013)
Personal details
Nationality	American
Political party	Democratic
Spouse	Connie Schultz

Sherrod Brown (born November 9 1952) is the Junior Senator from the state of Ohio.

Early life

Brown was born in Mansfield, Ohio. He became an Eagle Scout in 1967. He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Russian studies from Yale University (New Haven, Connecticut) in 1974. At Yale, he was in Davenport College, the same residential college as U.S. Presidents George H.W. and George W. Bush. He went on to receive a Master of Arts degree in education and public administration from Ohio State University (Columbus, Ohio) in 1981. He taught at the Mansfield branch campus of Ohio State University from 1979 to 1981.

Career in politics

State politics

Brown served as an Ohio state representative from 1975 to 1982. He was one of the youngest state representatives in Ohio history, and supposedly, shortly after taking office, he was mistaken for an intern and asked to fetch coffee by a staffer. In 1982, he won a four-way Democratic primary that included Dennis Kucinich, now a Cleveland Congressman, then defeated Republican Virgil Brown in the general election for the office of Ohio Secretary of State, succeeding Anthony J. Celebrezze Jr.. In 1986, Brown won re-election as secretary of state, defeating Vincent C. Campanella. In 1990, Brown lost when trying for a third term as secretary of state to Republican Bob Taft.

U.S. House of Representatives

In 1992, Brown won the Democratic primary for Ohio's 13th district, located in the western suburbs of Cleveland, after eight-term incumbent Ed Pease announced his retirement. This victory was tantamount to election in this heavily Democratic district. He was reelected six times, never facing substantive opposition.

Brown was an Ohio delegate to the 2000 Democratic National Convention. He was an unpledged delegate to the 2004 Democratic National Convention in Boston.

Brown was the ranking minority member on the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Health Subcommittee. He also served on the Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet and the Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade and Consumer Protection. As a member of the House International Relations Committee, he also served on the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific. He was a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

In 2001, the Republican-controlled legislature threatened to draw Brown's district out from under him. Brown threatened to run for governor in 2002 against incumbent Bob Taft. The Republicans backed down, and in fact made his district even more heavily Democratic by adding most of Akron.

In 2005, Brown led the Democratic effort to block the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA). For many months, Brown worked as whip on the issue, securing Democratic "nay" votes and seeking Republican allies. After several delays, the House of Representatives finally voted on CAFTA after midnight on July 28 2005. The Republican leadership kept the roll call open well past the 15 minute standard, and the House approved CAFTA by a vote of 217 to 215. CAFTA effectively passed by one vote - a tie would have resulted in a defeat.

Brown cites this stinging outcome as the impetus for the next stage of his career: running for the U.S. Senate.

2006 Senate campaign

Main article: Ohio United States Senate election, 2006

In the summer of 2005, Brown announced he would not run for the United States Senate seat held by Republican Mike DeWine. That fall, however, Brown reconsidered his decision to enter the ring. This announcement came shortly after Democrat Paul Hackett also stated that he would soon announce his candidacy. Within Ohio, Brown's decades of involvement in Ohio politics, including his years in statewide office, have given him high name recognition amongst Ohioans and a considerable fundraising advantage. In addition to his Senate campaign, Brown also helped to support Reform Ohio Now to promote several state jurisdictional changes on the ballot in November 2005.

On February 13 2006, Hackett withdrew from the race, all but ensuring that Brown would win the Democratic nomination. In the May 2 primary, Brown won 78.05% of the Democratic vote. His opponent, Merrill Samuel Keiser, Jr., received 21.95% of the vote.

On November 7, 2006, Brown faced two-term incumbent senator DeWine in the general election. By 2:17 A.M. on November 8, most major television networks had declared Brown the winner against Dewine. Brown won the seat with 56% of the vote to Dewine's 44%.[1]

Subject of negative campaigning

One of DeWine's ads, aired in October 2006, suggests that opponent Sherrod Brown did not pay an unemployment tax bill for 13 years. This claim led to the Associated Press reporting on October 19, 2006 that, "Several Ohio television stations have stopped airing a Republican ad because state documents contradict the ad's accusation that Democratic U.S. Senate candidate Sherrod Brown didn't pay an unemployment tax bill for 13 years." Brown has produced a commercial citing these facts. [2] Citing a clerical error, Brown actually paid the $1,700 bill, which was due in 1993, in April 1994.[3]

Another controversy which arose during the Senate campaign was an allegation of Sherrod Brown permitting drug trading during his time in the Secretary of State office. Although proven false over a decade earlier, the Dewine campaign publicized the event and even aired a television ad featuring a woman who investigated the case. However, the woman's husband was a Republican operative with connections to Mike Dewine's campaign; and Mike Dewine tried to hide the fact that Sherrod Brown was the person who summoned authorities, and that Brown also fired the person responsible in the drug incident.

Brown was the subject of a misunderstanding by Rush Limbaugh on his radio program on February 14 2006. Commenting on Hackett's withdrawal from the Senate race the previous day, Limbaugh declared there was a racial element to that withdrawal, making that statement on the erroneous assumption that Brown was black. (Limbaugh apparently perceived "Sherrod" as a more common name among African-Americans than among whites.) He was corrected and withdrew his statement later in the same program.

Family

Brown's wife, Connie Schultz, is a Pulitzer Prize-winning columnist on leave from Cleveland's Plain Dealer newspaper. Brown's daughter Emily works for the Service Employees International Union. His daughter Elizabeth is a senior at Columbia University, and his stepdaughter Caitlin is a sophomore at John Carroll University. His stepson Andrew C. Gard is a doctoral student (Ph.D., Mathematics) at Ohio State University. Brown and his family are Lutherans.

Electoral history

2006 General Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	2,257,369	56.16
	Mike DeWine (R)	1,761,037	43.82
	Sherrod Brown (D) defeats 2 term incumbent Mike DeWine.

2004 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	201,004	67.43
	Robert Lucas (R)	97,090	32.57
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected to a 7th term

2002 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	123,025	68.97
	Ed Oliveros (R)	55,357	31.03
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected to a 6th term

2000 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	170,058	64.6
	Rick Jeric (R)	84,295	32
	Michael Chmura (L)	5,837	2.2
	David Kluter (N)	3,108	1.2
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected to a 5th term

1998 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	115,168	61.6
	Grace L. Drake (R)	71,789	38.4
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected to a 4th term

1996 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	146,690	60.49
	Kenneth Blair Jr. (R)	87,108	35.92
	David Kluter (N)	8,707	3.59
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected to a 3rd term

1994 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	92,360	49.11
	Gregory A. White (R)	85,557	45.49
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected to a 2nd term

1992 Congressional Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	126,667	53.9
	Margaret R. Mueller	81,664	34.7
	Sherrod Brown (D) elected to a 1st term

1990 General Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	1,604,058	46.99
	Bob Taft (R)	1,809,416	53.00
	Sherrod Brown (D) defeated for a third term as Ohio Secretary of State

1986 General Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	1,805,833	59.72
	Vincent C. Campanella (R)	1,217,803	40.27
	Sherrod Brown (D) re-elected as Ohio Secretary of State

1982 General Election

Candidate		Votes	%
	Sherrod Brown (D)	1,739,602	53.59
	Virgil E. Brown (R)	1,362,079	41.96
	Margaret Ann Leach (L)	143,943	4.43
	Sherrod Brown (D) elected Ohio Secretary of State

Author

Brown is the author of two books:

• Congress from the Inside: Observations from the Majority and the Minority ISBN 0-87338-630-2
• Myths of Free Trade: Why American Trade Policy Has Failed ISBN 1-56584-928-0

See also

• Ohio United States Senate elections
• Election Results, U.S. Representative from Ohio, 13th District
• List of United States Representatives from Ohio

External links

• Sherrod Brown on the Issues
• Official U.S. Senate Campaign site
• Sherrod Brown's Blog at Huffington Post
• About.com's Inside Profile of Sherrod Brown, New US Senator from Ohio
• 2006 campaign finances, an analysis by Center for Responsive Politics.
• Positions and voting record, an analysis by Project Vote Smart.
• Template:CongBio2
• http://www.sos.state.oh.us/index.aspx

References

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