In September, Ohio GOP gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy posted (and quickly deleted) a video on social media featuring himself shaking hands with a registered sex offender. He again featured that same man in a television campaign ad a month later, according to reporting from The Bulwark.
In 2006, Amherst, Ohio, resident Vernon Edwards pleaded guilty to “gross sexual imposition,” which according to Ohio law involves sexual contact with a minor. He was charged in a case involving a 13-year-old girl, though he faced many similar allegations against his nieces.
While Edwards didn’t have a speaking role in Ramaswamy’s commercial, he’s included in the B-roll footage as his wife Patty speaks about how the embattled gubernatorial candidate lowered her property taxes.
The Ramaswamy campaign said it had no prior knowledge of Edwards’s criminal history.
“This ad was based on a real interaction between Vivek and an Ohio woman who was distraught at a county fair because she may have to move out of her home due to rising property taxes. We had no knowledge of the circumstances now being reported,” Ramaswamy spokesperson Evan Machan told The Bulwark. “The man has been removed from the ad. The fact of the matter is that property taxes are insanely high and causing many Ohioans to consider moving out of their homes. Vivek is the leader who will fix it.”
Patty told The Bulwark that the charges against her husband, which he pleaded guilty to 20 years ago, were “false.”
“Even if [the allegations] were true, the man did do his time back to society, and he has been an exemplary citizen at this point,” she said, referring to the eight years in prison her husband was sentenced to. “And again, Vivek reached out to me. I am not accused of anything. I am an American citizen. I’m allowed to do this.”
Ramaswamy is currently locked in a close midterm race with Democratic gubernatorial nominee Amy Acton.