Former Senator Sherrod Brown’s comeback in the Ohio Senate race could be complicated by socialist candidate Greg Levy, who is making a play to win over progressive voters in the critical battleground. Brown, a Democrat, is challenging Republican Senator Jon Husted in what has become one of the most competitive races of the midterms. Polls point to a close contest in the Buckeye State, despite its rightward drift over the past decade, as President Donald Trump’s declining approval rating fuels a political environment seen as more favorable to the Democrats.
As Democrats hope 2026 could be the year they flip back Ohio, they will need to contend with the Party for Socialism and Liberation running Levy as a candidate who could win over some progressive voters. Those progressives could be critical to Brown building a victorious coalition in the November 3 election. Levy’s campaign recently garnered attention after mailers promoting his campaign were sent out by the Enough Promises Ohio PAC, which the reported has ties to Republican groups.
The mailers, Levy wrote in a post to X, were “falsely impersonating” his campaign, which has “no ties” to the groups circulating them. The concern for Democrats would be that if the race is as close as it is expected to be, even a slim progressive revolt could make a difference when the votes are counted. While Levy is not receiving much support in the polls, Ohio is seen as a toss-up that could be decided by a razor-thin margin.
Paul Beck, professor emeritus and academy professor of political science at Ohio State University, told Newsweek this could matter if the race proves to be particularly close. Still, he noted that third party candidates “tend to do worse in voting as the election nears, with voters not wanting to waste their votes.” Levy “would be a far more serious threat in the governor's race, where [Democratic gubernatorial candidate] Amy Acton has been tacking to the right,” David Niven, professor at the University of Cincinnati's School of Public and International Affairs, told Newsweek. He said that Brown doesn’t have an issue with the left flank of the Democratic Party.
Levy told Newsweek that he was “called on to represent our socialist program” after his party “decided it was time for bold intervention” and to run in Ohio. He said priorities include cutting the Pentagon budget by 90 percent, seizing the top 100 corporations to “place them under democratic worker control,” ending “the war on Black America,” putting police under community control and the abolition of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
He said he is “clearly different” from Brown, who he said “represents the same tired political interests of the billionaire class that have thrown Ohio workers further into poverty, war, and the racist prison system.” “This campaign is for all workers who want a better future, where they control power themselves, not the billionaires,” he said. Levy's campaign is “not cavalier about the right-wing agenda of Trump,” but believes there is “no basis whatsoever that Democrats will at all change the trajectory of this turn towards eviscerating the gains won in the labor and civil rights struggles.” After the Ohio primaries in May, Levy called on Brown to drop out of the race, saying that the former senator has “refused to meet the moment” on issues like abolishing ICE, foreign policy and health care. One recent poll highlighted the challenge facing Brown and Democrats in Ohio.
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