Dem campaign arm backing Strickland for Ohio Senate

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee announced its support on Tuesday for former Ohio Gov. Ted Strickland’s (D) bid for Ohio Senate.

The endorsement puts further pressure on Democrat P.G. Sittenfeld, a 30-year-old Cincinnati city councilman, to back out of the race.

{mosads}“Ted Strickland has a long record of fighting for working folks in Ohio and there is no question that he is the strongest candidate to defeat Rob Portman,” DSCC Executive Director Tom Lopach said in a statement.

The DSCC said early Republican attacks against Strickland are evidence that incumbent Sen. Rob Portman (R) and his “special interest allies” are “afraid to run against Ted and don’t want to defend Portman’s record of outsourcing jobs, supporting plans that dismantle Social Security and Medicare, and standing with Washington lobbyists over middle class Ohioans.”

“We look forward to supporting Ted Strickland’s campaign and are confident that he will be a great senator,” the DSCC said.

Strickland has been rolling out lawmaker endorsements as he seeks to beat back the challenge from Sittenfeld. On Monday, Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) threw his weight behind the former Ohio governor.

Sittenfeld is a rising star in the party, and he had a lot of early buzz among Democrats before it became clear that Strickland would enter the race.

But many Democrats believe the more experienced Strickland is best equipped to take on Portman, who has $5.8 million in his campaign fund and the backing of essentially every elected Republican in the state.

Sittenfield reiterated after the DSCC announcement that he’s remaining in the race and won’t back down to pressure from D.C. 

“Our campaign is about and for hard-working, everyday Ohioans whose concerns have gone unrepresented in Washington for far too long because insiders like Rob Portman have put the interests of his friends ahead of our state,” Sittenfield said in a statement emailed to The Hill.

“It’s about people like Ron Jackson who worked with me to install crosswalks so seniors like him could safely catch the bus; it’s about Nikki Steele who made her community safer by helping me repair street lights in low-income neighborhoods in Cincinnati. The endorsements that matter most are the ones from Ohioans like Ron and Nikki — and I will continue working hard to earn them.”

This post was updated at 2:25 p.m.