We twice asked Vivek Ramaswamy if his campaign had anything to do with it. They wouldn’t give us a straight answer.
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It’s an ugly day in Ohio politics. In a governor’s race where most polls show Republican entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy trailing Amy Acton, a Democratic doctor, a mysterious new ad features Acton’s estranged mother, who sided with Acton’s stepfather after she accused him of molesting her.
This ad sounds pretty bad. What does it say?
The clip, which you can watch here, features Donna Arthur, Acton’s birth mother, hurling some ugly allegations. Arthur accuses Acton of “lying about her opponent,” Ramaswamy, and of having “lied her entire life,” including about her background. What the ad doesn’t mention is that Acton became estranged from her mother after accusing her stepfather—whom Arthur married after getting divorced from Acton’s birth father—of sexually abusing her between the ages of 9 and 12. In a 2019 interview with a Youngstown newspaper, Acton said her stepfather was arrested and faced criminal charges and that she hasn’t seen her mom since they went to court in connection with the case.
Who is Acton and how has she responded to the ad?
Acton led Ohio’s response to the COVID pandemic as the state’s Department of Health director, a position the state’s current Republican governor appointed her to. On Tuesday, her campaign put out a statement from Philip Stearns, Acton’s brother, corroborating her account of abuse and implying that Ramaswamy was behind the ad. Stearns called Ramaswamy “a pathetic excuse for a man who is willing to hurt anyone as long as it gets him what he wants.”
Tough words. But who is Ramaswamy, again?
Ramaswamy, the Cincinnati-born son of Indian immigrants, is a former biopharmaceutical CEO who ran for president in 2024 as a kind of Donald Trump mini-me. Ramaswamy has also seemed to take aim at Acton’s backstory before. Earlier this year, he described his candidacy as a chance to elect a governor with “a positive vision for our state versus a governor who has none at all other than to complain about what someone else did to her”—a remark some have read as blaming Acton for her own alleged abuse.
So does that mean his campaign made the ad?
Strangely, we don’t know. The clip, which conservative influencers have shared on X, has the hallmarks of a campaign ad: direct-to-camera talk from Arthur, grainy black-and-white footage of Acton, and fearmongering scare quotes. Yet it lacks the usual on-screen disclaimers about who funded it, so I reached out to Ramaswamy’s campaign to ask whether it had any involvement with the video. A spokesperson named Connie Luck neither confirmed nor denied the campaign’s involvement and wouldn’t say whether Ramaswamy stood by its message. “We don’t know what happened between Amy and her mother,” Luck said, before going on to call Acton “a serial fabulist who has some serious problems with the truth.”
So what is the truth here?
This isn’t the first time Arthur has disputed her daughter’s claims. Speaking to a conservative group in 2020, Arthur quibbled with the reported number of times the family moved around (Arthur says it was six, not the 18 or so moves Acton claims) and denied her daughter’s account of sometimes going hungry and at one point living out of a tent. But even Arthur’s version of events does confirm that Acton accused her stepfather of rape, that a grand jury investigated it, and that Arthur visited court “to support her husband.” On Tuesday, the conservative outlet National Review reported that “court records confirm many key parts of Acton’s account of her life,” including the charges against her stepfather.
Video from Slate
At the very least, the ad is a slimy attempt to weaponize a family dispute. If Acton’s accusations are true, then the ad provides a platform to someone who sided with Acton’s abuser—while also attempting to leverage that abuse for political gain.
What does this mean for the governor’s race?
Ohio was already pretty red—it last elected a Democratic governor in 2006—and has swung further right in the Trump era. Yet it hasn’t actually been that long since Democrats were competitive there. Sherrod Brown, an economic populist, represented the state in the Senate until last year and is currently running to reclaim his old job. Polls generally show him leading, sometimes by an even bigger margin than they show Acton up on Ramaswamy, which means Republican nerves may be warranted. This also isn’t the first political rake Ramaswamy has stepped on. Last week, the Bulwark reported that one of his campaign ads featured Ramaswamy meeting with a registered sex offender.
I know that’s a pretty heavy story to wade through, so my colleagues have put together a few lighter reads to help you refocus:
Tesla launches a new chapter: Elon Musk unveiled the new Tesla Roadster with a flashy demo of the car’s ability to fly (or, more accurately, to hover briefly). Matthew DeBord argues that this stunt “tells you everything you need to know about where Tesla is headed as a company.”
The critics tangle with Taylor Swift: The singer’s recent singles, including “Patient Zero,” have not, to put it mildly, been critical darlings, but they are holding steady on the charts. Slate music critic and Hit Parade host Chris Molanphy explains what is going on.
The tradwives leave their aprons behind: Influencers like Nara Smith and Ballerina Farms have gone viral on social media in recent years, but the trend of submissive, devout women evangelizing about their lifestyle predates TikTok and Instagram. Now, some members of the earlier generation of tradwives are sounding the alarm about the movement.
A comedian shares his serious side: Murray Hill is an old-school entertainer in the mold of retro lounge singers and Borscht Belt comedians. You might be familiar with him as a longtime fixture of the NYC nightlife scene or as an actor on HBO’s Somebody Somewhere. On a new episode of Death, Sex & Money, host Anna Sale talks with Hill about his tumultuous childhood and the support system that helped him become the man he is today.
OK, time for me to dip out for the night. See you tomorrow!