Vivek Ramaswamy’s running mate has said out loud what critics of the campaign’s most notorious ad have been pointing out all week. The campaign believes Amy Acton’s account of the abuse she suffered as a child.
Ohio state Sen. Rob McColley, the Republican nominee for lieutenant governor, spoke to The New York Times at a pumpkin festival in Circleville on Friday night. He said the campaign doesn’t think Acton, the Democratic nominee for governor, lied about her childhood.
“Oh no, that is horrible,” McColley said. “We are accusing her of lying in her adult career.”
The ad features Acton’s estranged mother, Donna Arthur, calling her daughter a liar and urging Ohioans not to vote for her. Acton has said she hasn’t spoken to her mother since she was 12, when she was removed from her mother’s custody after her stepfather, Cledith Arthur, was arrested and charged with raping her.
Mahoning County court records back up Acton’s account, according to the Times. Her stepfather was indicted by a grand jury and then fled the area, and a warrant was issued for his arrest. Acton’s brother has said their mother stayed with him until he died in 2004.
In the ad, Donna Arthur calls her daughter a liar but doesn’t address the rape allegations.
Justin Barasky, a Democratic strategist in Ohio, said McColley’s comment made the ad even harder to defend.
“Rob McColley admits Vivek believes that Amy was raped by her Mother’s husband and that Amy’s Mom chose to stay with Amy’s rapist,” Barasky wrote on X along with alarm emojis. “Vivek Ramaswamy decided to use this woman in an ad anyway. Truly horrifying.”
CNN senior political reporter Aaron Blake called it “a great example of the logical somersaults the Vivek ad is making his allies do,” adding that “his own running mate basically concedes that, yes, the mother they used in their ad stayed with a man who sexually abused her daughter.”
Ramaswamy hasn’t backed down. His campaign has bought more than $4 million in Ohio airtime to run the ad, according to the Times.
“We ran an ad about lying,” Ramaswamy told supporters in Strongsville on Friday. “Amy Acton is lying. She has been lying this entire campaign about me.”
The ad has divided Republicans. Gov. Mike DeWine, who has endorsed Ramaswamy, called it “just plain wrong” and urged him to pull it. Sen. Jon Husted, who is in a tight race against former Sen. Sherrod Brown, said he wouldn’t have run it. President Donald Trump and Vice President JD Vance have defended it heavily.
Acton campaign spokeswoman Addie Bullock has called the ad “despicable,” “disturbing” and “disqualifying.”
“Ramaswamy will do anything, including embrace child sex predators, to get what he wants,” Bullock said.