WASHINGTON, D.C. — Abortion and reproductive rights have been a major campaign issue in every election since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade two years ago. It’s no different in Ohio, where Sen. Sherrod Brown is making reproductive rights a centerpiece of his campaign against businessman Bernie Moreno.

As the issue can trigger strong emotions for many voters, the wrong stance can be politically toxic to candidates in either party. In Ohio’s Senate race, the two candidates have been tough to pin down on exactly what limits they want to see enacted.

Moreno’s messaging on abortion has evolved in recent years. When he unsuccessfully ran for Senate in 2022, Moreno told one interview he was “100 percent pro-life” with no exceptions.

In this year’s campaign, he backed a 15-week federal ban with exceptions, but also said he supported the Republican Party’s platform, which leaves the issue to states.

Ohio voters enshrined abortion rights in the state constitution last year.

“It’s mostly a state issue. Ohio has made that clear,” Moreno said in an interview with Spectrum News.

Moreno has also said he supports policies to help families, such as making contraception more accessible for women and lower the cost of both having kids and adoption.

“If at some point in the future, when we’re there as a country united around those concepts, we can get to a place where we say, hey, after 15 weeks, let’s just put some commonsense restrictions that we don’t have late term elective abortions, meaning a healthy mom and a healthy baby at week 38. I think that’s where we can get to,” Moreno said.

Moreno’s campaign added in a statement,

“Bernie has always said it should be primarily decided at the state level. Process wise, he’s comfortable with any path forward that ends elective, late term abortions with reasonable exceptions and saves as many babies as possible.”

Moreno and Brown have frequently taken jabs at each other's stance on abortion rights in ads and interviews. Brown has claimed Moreno would vote for a federal abortion ban, while Moreno has claimed Brown supports abortion up until birth.

Brown’s campaign declined to specify whether he supports any limits on abortion rights, but pointed to a bill he co-sponsored last year. The Women’s Health Protection Act would allow abortions without limitations before fetal viability—which is generally considered around 24 weeks of gestation. After viability, the bill would allow abortions only in cases when the mother’s life or health were in danger, though individual states could remove those limits.

“I think that women and their physicians and their families should make their choice about their own health care, not the politicians,” Brown said in a March interview.

Abortion also features prominently in the presidential race. When former President Donald Trump ran for office in 2016, he called for the Supreme Court to end the right to an abortion, which the Court did, with support from the three Justices Trump appointed.

Trump has more recently said states should decide.

Vice President Kamala Harris is campaigning on a national law to guarantee the right to abortion up to viability, the standard under Roe v. Wade.