Amid a bipartisan backlash roiling his bid to become Ohio's next governor, Republican Vivek Ramaswamy has taken a page out of President Donald Trump’s book: He’s doubling down.
After members of his own party said he should stop airing a controversial ad featuring the estranged mother of his Democratic opponent Amy Acton, Ramaswamy's campaign said it would spend $4 million to air it through Election Day. Speaking to supporters at the Strongsville Pancake Breakfast on Oct. 23, Ramaswamy said he wouldn't bend to the pressure he's received to stop running it.
“What we need is a governor at the top – just like President Trump is for our country – a governor for this state who stands strong, who says 'We will not play on your terms,'” Ramaswamy said.
“We will stand for what we know is right and true, and we will not apologize for it.”
Since his 2024 presidential run, the 41-year-old billionaire has pitched himself as a Trump-like figure and followed the MAGA playbook. A key part of the strategy, as the president has shown, is leaning into controversy.
Trump carried 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 the Ohio governor's race will serve as either validation of the tactics that elevated Trump or a cautionary tale about trying to emulate the president's unique political appeal.
The campaign has defended its use of an ad featuring Acton's mother, Donna Arthur, in which she calls her daughter a "liar" who has been untruthful 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 of 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 low," saying he and Acton suffered physical and emotional abuse from their stepfather.
Acton's mother left the state with Cledith Arthur when he fled to evade prosecution and stayed with him until his death. Acton has 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 has defended the ad and encouraged Ramaswamy to keep airing it. Vice President JD Vance, a former senator from Ohio, has criticized Republicans he accused of “whining” about the spot. Ramaswamy said Oct. 23 that the ad “had nothing to do with childhood abuse” and vowed to prosecute such cases if elected.
"The liberal media continues to launder Democrat talking points to shield the least qualified candidate for governor in Ohio history," Connie Luck, a spokesperson for Ramaswamy's campaign, said in a statement to USA TODAY. "It's deplorable, but hardly surprising."
Recent polls have shown a tight race between Ramaswamy and Acton, a doctor who led the state department of health, under GOP Gov. Mike DeWine, during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. A Fox News survey conducted Oct. 15-19 found Acton leading Ramaswamy by two percentage points, within the margin of error. The nonpartisan Cook Political Report has rated the race as lean Democratic.
Liz Mair, a Republican strategist, said it’s possible the Ramaswamy campaign is banking on Acton’s campaign having to spend money amplifying its rebuttal to the ad in the final days of the campaign. But she expected that many voters would discount the attack in the first place, because they could imagine a scenario where their own estranged relative would publicly criticize them.
“Setting aside the efficacy, obviously I think ethically it's just a completely abhorrent thing to run,” Mair said. “This is a guy who's already had a lot of likability problems, and it looks like he’s prepared to double down on them 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 during the 2024 election cycle. He pitched himself as an America First candidate without Trump’s legal baggage who would protect the former president from his political enemies. In the lead up to 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 went on to become an enthusiastic booster and surrogate for Trump as he campaigned against former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley.
After the 2024 election, Trump named Ramaswamy as a co-lead of the Department of Government Efficiency alongside Elon Musk. Tensions were high between the two, according to a report from The New York Times. Ramaswamy also angered parts of Trump's base with a December 2024 social media post arguing that tech companies hire foreign workers on H-1B visas over U.S. workers because “American culture has venerated mediocrity over excellence.”
When Ramaswamy launched his gubernatorial campaign in February 2025, a month after leaving DOGE, Musk said he had his “full endorsement.”
Trump’s early endorsement, as well as the backing of the state Republican Party, helped Ramaswamy clear most of the Republican field. (His main primary opponent was Casey Putsch, a businessman who leveled several racist remarks at Ramaswamy, whose parents immigrated from India to Ohio.)
Ramaswamy won endorsements from top Republican leaders and groups such as the Ohio Chamber of Commerce, which praised his economic platform and his work helping push through a state gas tax holiday that was signed into law earlier this month.
Ken Blackwell, a Republican who lost the 2006 Ohio governor's race, said he appreciated that Ramaswamy was one of the younger conservative politicians willing to put himself out there.
"Folks have to earn it, and that's why I respect Vivek getting in the arena,” Blackwell, who now chairs the Conservative Action Project, told USA TODAY. “He's willing to engage and take the applause or take the criticisms. That's how you determine the success of the transition to the next generation of MAGA leadership.”
But Ramaswamy has struggled throughout his campaign to command 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 to past Ohio GOP Gov. George V. Voinovich, said he had planned to split his ticket to back GOP Sen. Jon Husted for Senate and Acton for governor before the Arthur ad. Ramaswamy, he said, brought Trump-style rhetoric to the race that he didn’t find helpful. Policy-wise, he was turned off by Ramaswamy’s proposal to overhaul the state college system.
“Who is calling for that? Nobody is calling for that,” he said. “People are calling for action on the economy, healthcare, principally those issues, and nobody in their right mind is walking around calling for restructuring Ohio University.”
There have also been some embarrassing moments.
Ramaswamy was mocked over the poor form of his baseball swing in a campaign commercial and his struggle to pick up a child at a campaign rally. Republicans in the state criticized his use of a private jet to fly to campaign events, and worried about the contrast with Acton, who drives around in a Jeep.
Republicans acknowledge that the current political environment favors Democrats, and the governor's race is competitive. But they also see a path to victory for Ramaswamy and Husted.
"We just have so many more Republicans now in the state than we did the last time Democrats won, which was 2006," said Bob Clegg, an Ohio-based Republican strategist, referring to the last time Democrats an Ohio governor's race.
Other Republicans, however, have worried about Ramaswamy's campaign for months.
"Vivek is a terrible candidate to have at the top of the ticket. He's dragging down the Senate candidate,” former Trump adviser Steve Bannon said on his “War Room” show July 31. “I think Vivek's down by 5 or 6 points and he'll lose by more if he continues with what he's been saying on the campaign trail."
Riding it out
The latest controversy, however, has fully laid bare his struggles with the party.
“This is what desperate people do,” said Ted Berry, the City Council president in Grove City and a lifelong Republican, who is supporting Acton. “He doesn't have the issues in his favor, and he's out of touch with what Ohioans are feeling right now. And this is what we're getting.”
Husted and Secretary of State Frank LaRose have publicly said that they wouldn’t have run the ad. DeWine and other prominent state and national Republicans have said the ad should be taken down.
“This ad in Ohio should be taken off the air, absolutely. The people connected to it should apologize,” former Republican Ohio Gov. John Kasich said on MS NOW on Oct. 22. “This is just getting us lower and lower and lower in terms of how we conduct our elections.”
But like the candidate, the president is standing firm. At a recent rally, Trump said Ramaswamy asked what he should do about the backlash he was getting over 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’ve got to ride with it.’”
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Ramaswamy follows Trump's playbook in tight Ohio governor's race
