Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine on Thursday condemned a campaign ad by fellow Republican Vivek Ramaswamy that features Democratic gubernatorial candidate Amy Acton’s estranged mother, and he called on the Ramaswamy campaign to take the ad down. The ad, which is airing through Election Day, features Acton’s mother, Donna Arthur, accusing her daughter of lying about her upbringing.
DeWine did not rescind his endorsement of Ramaswamy, the Republican nominee for governor. He endorsed Ramaswamy in January after the biotech entrepreneur picked Ohio Senate President Rob McColley as his running mate, and he told reporters he endorses the whole Republican ticket.
“It was just wrong to run this ad,” DeWine said, speaking after describing his history as a county prosecutor defending child rape victims. He said the ad is deeply troubling on its face, and more so given the backstory: Acton has not talked to her mother since she was 12, when Arthur’s husband and Acton’s stepfather was charged with rape for sexually abusing a young Acton, and a grand jury indicted him.
DeWine also spoke favorably of Acton, who served as his health director during the COVID-19 pandemic. Asked about telling the truth, he said his experience working closely with her every single day was that she certainly told the truth.
The Ramaswamy campaign refused to pull the ad. Spokeswoman Connie Luck said the first and only candidate to attack the mother of her opponent in this race was Acton, pointing to an Acton news release that accused Ramaswamy’s mother of participating in a scheme involving an Alzheimer’s disease drug trial. No one has been charged in that case, and PolitiFact called an Acton ad on the issue mostly false. DeWine said that release was also wrong and should not have happened, while noting the Ramaswamy ad is on television with $4 million behind it.
Other Republicans split over the ad. Vice President JD Vance told Republicans a day earlier to stop whining about it. Former Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost, who ran against Ramaswamy in the primary, pushed back on a social media post by Ohio Republican Party Chairman Alex Triantafilou about keeping score. Secretary of State Frank LaRose and U.S. Senate candidate Jon Husted said they would not have run the ad, and former Gov. John Kasich called it completely inappropriate and said it should be taken off the air.
The dispute lands in the final stretch of the governor’s race, with early voting already underway across Ohio ahead of the Nov. 3 general election. Ramaswamy has doubled down on the ad, saying voters should know that those closest to Acton think she is lying about her background.
For Ohio voters, the exchange is now a central fight in the race to succeed DeWine in the governor’s office. The ad remains on the air, the campaign says it is staying up, and both sides are heading into the last days before Election Day arguing over it.
Photo: Sixflashphoto, CC BY-SA