COLUMBUS, Ohio—Democrat Sherrod Brown has decided to run in 2026 for U.S. Senate, attempting a return to the office that he lost last year after a savagely fought reelection campaign, according to Ohio labor leaders Brown told of his thinking.

Brown’s decision, which comes after months of speculation about his political future, gives Ohio Democrats perhaps their best hope of unseating incumbent U.S. Sen. Jon Husted, a Columbus-area Republican appointed to the job earlier this year.

The winner of next year’s Senate campaign will only serve for two years before there’s another election for the seat in 2028. However, Brown’s entry in the race immediately propels Ohio’s U.S. Senate campaign to near the top of Senate Democrats’ priority races next year as they make an uphill attempt to flip the four GOP-held seats needed to win back control of the Senate in 2027.

Brown lost his bid for a fourth Senate term last year to now-U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno, a Westlake Republican, in a race that cost the two sides nearly half a billion dollars in total. Brown ran about 2.5 percentage points ahead of Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, but he lost to Moreno by about 4 percentage points, as Republican now-President Donald Trump won Ohio by more than 11 percentage points.