By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Before meeting with a packed room of Democrats downtown on Wednesday, U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown sat down for some deep fried cauliflower and diet Mountain Dew at Sunset Bistro in Bowling Green.
The stop in Wood County came on the heels of hits to reproductive rights and new revelations about the lengths the last president went to after losing the 2020 election.
“The American people who need to watch it, aren’t,” Brown said of the Jan. 6 hearings. “There will always be a third of Americans who don’t want to accept it.”
But the hearings serve a higher purpose, according to the senator.
“You want to know if you had a president who has done something no president has ever tried in nearly 250 years – to overthrow the government,” he said. “We are not going to let this happen again. We will preserve our democracy.”
Brown also expressed anguish over the Supreme Court’s striking down of Roe v. Wade, which had guaranteed reproductive rights for American girls and women for nearly 50 years.
He talked about his daughters and granddaughters. “They have fewer rights,” than older generations in their family. Politicians have no business usurping a family’s decision of how to handle the rape of a teenager, he said.
“It took one decision by these unelected radicals on the Supreme Court to overturn what had been law for 50 years.”
Brown does not think Washington is ready to expand the court in an effort to bring about more balanced decisions.
“I don’t think that’s going to happen very soon,” he said.
But he does foresee changes based on voters being united in opposition to Supreme Court decisions and Trump’s attempt to overthrow the government.
“I expect a huge vote among young people,” he said.
Brown predicted the Senate would add two Democratic seats, making Joe Manchin less of a roadblock to Democratic efforts, he said.
“This time next year, Roe v. Wade will be codified law,” if the Democrats can also retain its majority in the House, he said.
Brown acknowledged that gas prices and inflation will influence some midterm voters. But he added, “Most people understand it’s a worldwide problem right now.”
Brown defended the first major federal gun legislation passed by Congress with bipartisan support in decades. While it is too little too late for many victims, it is a start, he said.
“It’s a major step forward. I would have wanted to do more,” Brown said. “There will still be mass killings.”
Of course, that legislative victory was deflated a bit by the Supreme Court’s opinion in the same week striking down a major gun control law in New York.
The gun industry retains a stranglehold on many in the Republican party, who refuse to acknowledge that the overpopulation of guns helps lead to the high number of shootings in the U.S., he said.
“There are far too many spineless politicians,” he said.
“Every country has mental illness,” but yet they don’t see a fraction of the mass shootings experienced here. “No country has guns like this.”
Not addressed in the legislation is the sale of semi-automatic rifles used in many mass shootings.
“Civilians don’t need those weapons,” Brown said. “Those are not weapons for self defense.”
Brown criticized Ohio legislators and Gov. Mike DeWine for responding to the latest mass shooting in a school by passing a bill allowing teachers to be armed.
“That’s one of the stupidest ideas, to allow teachers to carry guns,” he said. “The answer to Uvalde is to give every teacher guns?” Another victory for gun manufacturers, Brown said.
Later in the afternoon at Grounds for Thought, Brown took questions for nearly an hour from a packed room of local residents. He heard comments about the Supreme Court’s chipping away at voters’ rights, and about the targeting of minorities by the last administration.
The crowd ranged from students to senior citizens.
One woman noted that as she attended a reproductive rights rally on Sunday, she was struck to see another Bowling Green woman, Sandy Wicks, wearing a button she had worn 50 years earlier of a slash through a coat hangar.
At the other end of the age spectrum, 14-year-old Calla Higgins asked, “How do we keep the courts from taking away more rights?”
Brown predicted there will be more agonizing rulings to come – on gay marriage, contraception, and envirionmental issues. But with each decision, the court will further fuel efforts to fight back.
“They will get their way for awhile. But they will pay a price,” he said.
Brown also listened as Kirsty Sayer questioned how the Democratic party can satisfy the more progressive members, including those who wonder why Roe hadn’t already been codified.
“What are the establishment Democrats willing to do,” Sayer asked.
“I share those frustrations,” Brown said. But Democrats can only do so much with the filibuster in place. He encouraged Democrats to come together, rather than split off into factions and “cost us another election.”
Brown also listened as some expresssed fears that Trump could be elected again.
“He’s not going to be president again because two-thirds of Americans aren’t going to let him,” Brown reassured.
“I’m thinking this is finally catching up to him,” he said of the Jan. 6 hearings.
