Dale Romans, Louisville Horse Racing Trainer, to Run for US Senate

Dale Romans has won plenty of races. Now the famed horse trainer is trying to win a different kind of race.

On Wednesday morning, the famed horse trainer from Louisville announced his bid for U.S. Senate. He will be on the Democratic primary ticket for the seat that was held for decades by Mitch McConnell.

Romans, a 1984 graduate of Butler High School, has spent most of his life on the backside of Churchill Downs. Between 2017 and 2020, he held the title of the winningest trainer ever beneath the famed Twin Spires. According to Equibase, Romans has more than 2,200 career wins as a trainer with nearly 15,000 starts and approximately $127 million in career earnings.

A victory on the First Saturday in May has eluded Romans, but he did win the 2011 Preakness with Shackleford. His resume also includes three Breeders’ Cup wins, a victory in the Dubai World Cup, and he scored an upset over American Pharoah when Keen Ice captured the 2015 Travers Stakes.

A sports figure running for political office is not unheard of. Former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville is currently one of Alabama’s U.S. Senators. Brereton Jones parlayed his success as a horse breeder into a residency at the Kentucky Governor’s Mansion from 1987-91.

Romans does not have experience holding office, but he’s dabbled in the game of politics in various horse racing organizations. He currently leads the Kentucky Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association, and he was appointed to the Kentucky Horse Racing and Gaming Corporation in the spring.

For generations, Kentucky was a blue state. That’s clearly no longer the case. Romans prefers a shade of purple. A self-described centrist, he cited former West Virginia Senator Joe Manchin as an example of the style he would use to represent Kentucky in Washington.

“He did a lot of good things for this country, and he voted for what was best for West Virginia and for the country. He was a deciding vote on a lot of issues where he didn’t go down party line, and I’m sure he had both sides mad at him quite a bit,” Romans told the Herald-Leader. “I would like to be just like he was in Washington.”

Kentucky voters will decide in 2026 who will replace McConnell in the Senate. Romans is one of a handful of Democratic candidates, joining Amy McGrath, state House Minority Leader Pamela Stevenson, former Secret Service agent Logan Forsythe, and ex-CIA agent Joel Willett. The top three candidates for the Republican Party are U.S. Rep. Andy Barr, former Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron, and Lexington businessman Nate Morris.

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