Updated October 25, 2026, 10:32 a.m. ET
Amid a bipartisan backlash that is undermining his bid to become Ohio’s next governor, Republican Vivek Ramaswamy has taken a page from President Donald Trump’s book: He’s doubling down.
After members of his own party said he should stop airing a controversial ad featuring his Democratic opponent’s ex-mother Amy Acton, Ramaswamy’s campaign announced it would spend $4 million to air it through Election Day. Speaking to his supporters at the Strongsville Pancake Breakfast on October 23, Ramaswamy said he would not give in to the pressure he received to stop leading it.
“What we need is a governor at the top – just like President Trump is for our country – a governor of this state who is strong, who says ‘We will not play on your terms,’” Ramaswamy said. “We will stand up for what we know to be right and true, and we will not apologize for it. »
Since his 2024 presidential campaign, the 41-year-old billionaire has presented himself as a Trump-like figure and followed the MAGA playbook. A key part of the strategy, as the president has shown, is to lean into controversy.
Trump won Ohio in all three of his White House bids, including by 11 percentage points in 2024, helping turn the former swing state bright red. But for Ramaswamy and other young Republicans, the results of Ohio’s gubernatorial race will either serve as validation of the tactics that elevated Trump or as a caution against trying to emulate the president’s unique political appeal.
The campaign defended the use of an ad featuring Acton’s mother, Donna Arthur, in which she called her daughter a “liar” who lied about her past. Acton’s stepfather, Cledith Arthur, was charged with rape in 1978 for sexually abusing her. Acton’s father reported the alleged abuse towards his daughter, who was 12 at the time. Acton’s brother, Philip Stearns, responded to the Ramaswamy campaign ad, which he condemned as a “despicable bastard,” saying he and Acton suffered physical and emotional abuse at the hands of their stepfather.
Acton’s mother left the state with Cledith Arthur when he fled to escape prosecution and stayed with him until his death. Acton said she hasn’t seen or spoken to her mother since 1978, when the court removed her and her brother from her mother’s custody.
Trump defended the ad and encouraged Ramaswamy to continue airing it. Vice President JD Vance, a former senator from Ohio, criticized Republicans who he accused of “whining” about the situation. Ramaswamy said on October 23 that the ad “had nothing to do with childhood abuse” and pledged to pursue such cases if elected.
“The liberal media continues to whitewash Democrats’ arguments to protect the least qualified gubernatorial candidate in Ohio history,” Connie Luck, a spokesperson for Ramaswamy’s campaign, said in a statement to USA TODAY. “It’s deplorable, but it’s not surprising.”
Recent polls have shown a tight race between Ramaswamy and Acton, a doctor who led the state Health Department under Republican Gov. Mike DeWine during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. A Fox News investigation conducted October 15-19 found that Acton led Ramaswamy by two percentage points, within the margin of error. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report called the race a skinny Democratic one.
Liz Mair, a Republican strategist, said it’s possible that Ramaswamy’s campaign is banking on Acton’s campaign having to spend money to amplify his rebuttal of the ad in the final days of the campaign. But she expected many voters would ignore the attack in the first place because they could imagine a scenario in which their own loved one publicly criticized them.
“Efficiency aside, I obviously think, from an ethical point of view, it’s just a completely abhorrent thing to run,” Mair said. “This is a guy who’s had a lot of sympathy problems before, and it seems like he’s ready to double down, as a sort of Hail Mary in the final days of the campaign.”
“Save Trump, vote Vivek”
After making his fortune in the biotech industry, Ramaswamy launched his political career by running for president in the 2024 election cycle. He presented himself as an America First candidate, without Trump’s legal baggage that would protect the former president from his political enemies. Ahead of the Iowa caucuses, Ramaswamy campaigned on the slogan “Save Trump, Vote Vivek.”
The challenge, of course, was that Trump was also in the race. Ramaswamy dropped out of the presidential race on the night of the Iowa caucuses after finishing fourth, and became an enthusiastic defender and surrogate for Trump as he campaigned against former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley.
After the 2024 election, Trump named Ramaswamy co-head of the Department of Government Effectiveness alongside Elon Musk. Tensions were high between the two, according to a New York Times report. Ramaswamy also angered parts of Trump’s base with a December 2024 social media post, claiming that tech companies hire foreign workers on H-1B visas rather than American workers because “American culture has worshiped mediocrity over excellence.”
When Ramaswamy launched his gubernatorial campaign in February 2025, a month after leaving DOGE, Musk said he had his “full support.”
Trump’s early support, along with support from the state Republican Party, helped Ramaswamy eliminate most of the Republican field. (His main primary opponent was Casey Putsch, a businessman who made several racist remarks against Ramaswamy, whose parents immigrated to Ohio from India.)
Ramaswamy has won support from top Republican leaders and groups such as the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, who praised his economic agenda and his work toward a state gas tax holiday that was signed into law earlier this month.
Ken Blackwell, a Republican who lost the Ohio gubernatorial race in 2006, said he appreciated that Ramaswamy was one of the younger conservative politicians willing to step forward.
“People have to earn it, and that’s why I respect Vivek’s entry into the arena,” Blackwell, who now chairs the Conservative Action Project, told USA TODAY. “He’s willing to engage and accept applause or criticism. That’s how you determine the success of the transition to the next generation of MAGA leaders.”
But Ramaswamy struggled throughout his campaign to garner the same level of loyalty from Republicans as the president. Republicans, including DeWine, have publicly criticized some of his policy proposals, including his call to explore consolidating the number of state colleges and universities.
Rocky Black, a former staffer for former Ohio Republican Gov. George V. Voinovich, said he had planned to split his ticket to support Republican Sen. Jon Husted for Senate and Acton for governor before Arthur’s ad. Ramaswamy, he said, brought Trump-style rhetoric to the race that he didn’t find helpful. Politically, he was put off by Ramaswamy’s proposal to reform the state college system.
“Who is calling for this? Nobody is calling for this,” he said. “People are calling for action on the economy, on health care, primarily on these issues, and no one in their right mind is going around calling for the restructuring of Ohio University.”
There were also some embarrassing moments.
Ramaswamy was mocked for the poor shape of his baseball swing in a campaign ad and his difficulty in picking up a child at a campaign rally. State Republicans criticized his use of a private jet to travel to campaign events and worried about the contrast with Acton, who travels by Jeep.
Republicans recognize that the current political environment favors Democrats and that the gubernatorial race is competitive. But they also see a path to victory for Ramaswamy and Husted.
“We have a lot more Republicans in the state now than the last time Democrats won, which was 2006,” said Bob Clegg, an Ohio-based Republican strategist, referring to the last time Democrats competed in an Ohio gubernatorial race.
Other Republicans, however, have been concerned about Ramaswamy’s campaign for months.
“Vivek is a terrible candidate to have at the top of the ticket. He’s dragging the Senate candidate down,” former Trump adviser Steve Bannon said on his show “War Room” on July 31. “I think Vivek is down by 5 or 6 points and he will lose even more if he continues with what he said during the election campaign.”
take it out
The latest controversy, however, has exposed his difficulties with the party.
“That’s what desperate people do,” said Grove City City Council President and lifelong Republican Ted Berry, who supports Acton. “He doesn’t have the issues in his favor, and he’s out of touch with what Ohioans are feeling right now. And that’s what we get.”
Husted and Secretary of State Frank LaRose have publicly stated that they would not have aired the ad. DeWine and other prominent national and state Republicans have said the ad should be removed.
“This ad in Ohio should absolutely be taken off the air. The people connected to it should apologize,” former Republican Ohio Governor John Kasich said on MS NOW on October 22.
But like the candidate, the president is holding on. At a recent rally, Trump said Ramaswamy asked what he should do about the backlash he felt about the ad.
“I got a call from Vivek. He said, ‘What would you recommend? Because I’m getting killed in the press,'” he said. “I said, ‘You have to roll with it.'”
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