Trump backs Ramaswamy ad after DeWine calls Ohio governor's race attack ad 'wrong'
Donald Trump rebuked Ohio governor Mike DeWine on Thursday after the Republican urged Vivek Ramaswamy's campaign to pull an attack ad against Democrat Amy Acton, telling the candidate to keep it airing ahead of the 3 November midterms.
Trump backs Ramaswamy ad after DeWine calls Ohio governor's race attack ad 'wrong'
Donald Trump publicly sided with Vivek Ramaswamy in the trump dewine ramaswamy ad dispute on Thursday, hours after Ohio's Republican governor Mike DeWine said Ramaswamy was wrong to release an attack ad against his Democratic rival in the Ohio governor's race, Amy Acton, that featured her estranged mother. DeWine had implored the campaign to take the ad down; Trump instead urged Ramaswamy to keep airing it and accused the governor of disloyalty.
Trump's Truth Social response
On Truth Social on Thursday afternoon, Trump wrote that DeWine was "disloyal to the Republican party" and said the governor probably wants a Democrat to win. "I suggested, on the other hand, that Vivek should keep it up," Trump wrote.
In the same post, Trump called Acton a "defective, dishonest, and incapable Candidate" who "uncontrollably, lies, cheats, and steals".
DeWine: 'It's wrong to run this ad'
Speaking to reporters at the Ohio state capital, DeWine called the ad "deeply, deeply troubling". According to the Associated Press, he said: "It's wrong to run this ad."
He added: "I would just urge the Ramaswamy campaign to take this down."
DeWine argued that family members have always historically been off limits. Acton had earlier this year raised Ramaswamy's mother's alleged involvement in a "pump and dump" scheme, though less prominently. Despite his criticism, DeWine declined to withdraw his endorsement of Ramaswamy, saying he wanted to support the "full ticket" of Republican candidates in the midterms.
The ad and Acton's family history
The ad circulated on social media earlier in the week, and Ramaswamy's campaign confirmed it was their work. It shows Acton's mother, Donna Arthur, calling her daughter "a liar" and saying she should not be put in charge of the state.
- Acton says she has not seen her mother Donna Arthur for decades. She has led Ramaswamy in recent polls of the governor's race.
- According to Acton, her mother married a man who sexually abused Acton when she was 12 years old, and stayed with him even after police stepped in.
- Acton's brother, Philip Stearns, called the ad "a despicable low" for Ramaswamy in a statement from her campaign. He noted that he and his sister were removed from Arthur's custody after her stepfather was arrested.
Other Ohio Republicans and Democrats react
Ramaswamy's campaign said later in the week it would spend $4m to air the ad across Ohio. Spokesperson Connie Luck rejected criticism of it: "We refuse to accept the media's double standards," she said, citing Democrats' use of Trump's and RFK Jr's family members in ads.
Other Republicans stopped short of DeWine's call to pull it, but distanced themselves:
- Vice-President JD Vance, speaking in Cincinnati on Wednesday, said: "Whether the ad was appropriate or not is not really my concern." He said he was disgusted by Republicans whining more about the advertisement than about what congressional Democrats want to do to the US, adding that "Politics is a tough business."
- Republican US senator Jon Husted, whose race could decide Senate control in the 3 November midterms, told the Associated Press: "I would not have run that ad."
- Ohio's Republican secretary of state Frank LaRose criticized the ad, telling ABC 6: "I probably wouldn't run an ad like that, but every candidate gets to make their own decision."
Husted's Democratic opponent, former senator Sherrod Brown, called the video "disgusting" and said all candidates should denounce it. DeWine, meanwhile, has kept his endorsement of Ramaswamy in place for the sake of the full Republican ticket.
