Bernie Moreno said he fled socialism in Colombia to the United States in 1971.What does history say? | Ohio

BErnie Moreno, Republican candidate us senate The Ohio man, who expected to mount a tough challenge to incumbent Democratic leftist Sherrod Brown, fled socialism when his family came to the United States from Colombia in 1971 when he was 4 years old. He says he came.

Such statements formed a central part of Moreno's campaign message as he seeks the Republican nomination with support from Donald Trump, but they do not withstand historical scrutiny.

In a 2020 interview, Moreno talked about his success as a car dealer in Ohio. explained He himself is someone who “immigrated to this country a long time ago to escape what is happening in most countries in South America, which is the absolute prison of socialism and its ideas.”

In 2021, Moreno will enter national politics with his first run for the Senate nomination, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported. Said He says he “came to the United States as a child with his mother and brother to escape socialism in his native Colombia. He believes the same ideology is on the rise in the United States, and he wants to fight back.”

But when Moreno was born on February 14, 1967; Columbia The National Front government lasted 16 years and is now in its ninth year, with the Conservatives and Liberals taking turns in power as a way to avoid violence between the two factions.

Furthermore, Colombia's first left-wing government was established. In modern times It is currently led by Gustavo Petro, who has been in power since 2022.

Colombia has long been a stronghold for left-wing guerrilla groups.According to the US explanation Congressional Research Servicewhen Moreno lived there, the country was home to a “Marxist-inspired left-wing insurgency, including the Farc, which was launched in 1964, and the smaller National Liberation Army (ELN), which was formed the following year.”

The CRS said these groups “carried out kidnappings, committed serious human rights violations, and carried out terrorist activities aimed at seizing the seat of the central government in Bogotá.”

However, Moreno depicts a childhood far from such worries.

By his own account, his father had served as health secretary under the conservative Misael Pastrana of the last National Front. president Between 1970 and 1974.

“We had a very, very, very, very wonderful life in Colombia,” Moreno said. in 2019At a business event in Cleveland, he added that his mother initially moved the family to the United States against his father's wishes because she “didn't want to raise us as spoiled indoor cats.”

Moreno said the move was “a leap of faith,” “but it was a fearless idea.”

Reached for comment Wednesday, Moreno's communications director, Regan McCarthy, said: [first] In the quote quoted, is Bernie saying that his family came to America because Colombia was a socialist country, or because his family was fleeing a socialist country at the time?

“He made it clear that many countries in South America were falling into socialism and that his parents, fearing that Colombia would eventually turn to socialism, came to America so they could raise their children in a free society. said.

As Mr. McCarthy's reference to “many South American countries” indicates, [falling] Moreno also spoke of his fear of being “besieged” by a socialist government.

Writing in 2021 with toledo blade“I was born in South America surrounded by socialist ideology,” he said.

In the same year, Moreno Said Cleveland podcast the Landscape: “I [US is] It will come off [in] This is a very dangerous direction. That's the direction I'm aware of.I grew up surrounded by socialist ideology, both in Venezuela and Cuba. [or] It's Peru now, and I know where this movie ends. ”

And, in the same campaign ad from 2021, Moreno Said: “I come from a country surrounded by radical ideologues like Fidel Castro and Che Guevara, who promised to give everyone everything they needed and solve all their problems. did. [Vermont senator] Bernie Sanders and AOC [New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez] I'm doing it today. ”

Even such claims waver under scrutiny.

In fact, Cuba has been ruled by the left since 1959, when Castro and the Communist Party took power after a long battle. Castro was supported by Argentine revolutionary Guevara, who was murdered in October 1967 when Moreno was eight months old.

When Moreno was a young child in Colombia in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Venezuela was ruled by Rafael Caldera, a Christian Democrat who worked to end the conflict with left-wing guerrillas. Ecuador, which borders Colombia, was also ruled by centrists at the time.

Between 1968 and 1975, Peru was led by Juan Velasco Alvarado. The general seized power in a coup, but ruled from the political center. The current president of Peru is Dina Bolarteis a former member of a Marxist party that currently governs with right-wing support.

From 1970 to 1973, Chile, more than 1,000 miles south of Colombia, was ruled by its first socialist president, Salvador Allende. He was killed on September 11, 1973, when the right-wing Chilean army, led by General Augusto Pinochet, attacked the presidential palace in a CIA-backed coup.

After coming to the United States in 1971, Moreno became a U.S. citizen. 6pm. In a statement Wednesday, McCarthy, a Moreno ally, accused the Guardian of failing to celebrate “what could become the first South American-born senator.”

The National Republican Senatorial Committee and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee did not respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman for Mr. Brown declined to comment.