GOP candidate is just a ‘small-town’ guy—whose family owns an NFL team

Sam Brown, the Republican challenging incumbent Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen in Nevada, first introduced himself to Silver State voters two years ago during his failed bid to unseat the state’s other Democratic senator, Catherine Cortez-Masto. He did it with an ad called “Duty.”

“I wasn’t born into power. I’m from small-town America,” he said in the 2022 ad. 

What he didn’t say is that his extended family owns the Cincinnati Bengals, an NFL team worth $4 billion, and that his relatives have been supporting his political ambitions for a while now.

To hear Brown talk, he comes from the most humble of backgrounds. His was a “sort of working-class family,” he told radio host Ken Wall back in 2021 (at about the 22-minute mark). That same year, he told a local news host that he comes from “salt of the earth people,” not from a “dynasty” (at 23:48). 

Speaking of dynasties, Brown’s great-grandfather, Paul Brown, founded the Bengals and his great-uncle, Michael Brown, is the current owner of the NFL team. So maybe a little bit of dynasty?