Members of both parties have criticised Ramaswamy for airing the advertisement featuring Acton's mother. Republican leader Nikki Haley described Ramaswamy as "a bad person" and expressed regret that he repeatedly manages to "get away with it."
The Ohio gubernatorial election is being contested between Ramaswamy and Acton. The election is scheduled for November 3, and opinion polls show Acton leading Ramaswamy by three percentage points.
Ramaswamy is an Indian-origin American billionaire biotechnology entrepreneur who has never held elected office. Acton is a physician who has previously worked as a public health official. Both have established reputations in their respective fields in Ohio, but their backgrounds are markedly different.
Despite experiencing poverty and childhood sexual abuse, Acton earned a medical degree from Northeastern Ohio University College of Medicine and a master's degree in public health from Ohio State University.
Ramaswamy was born in Cincinnati to Indian immigrant parents. His father was an engineer at General Electric, while his mother was a psychiatrist. After attending St. Xavier High School, he earned degrees from Harvard University and Yale Law School before building a multibillion-dollar fortune in the biotechnology sector.
Ohio has so far elected only white Christian men as governors. Consequently, either candidate would make history if elected. Acton would become the state's first female and first Jewish governor, while Ramaswamy would become Ohio's first Indian-American governor. He identifies himself as a Hindu-American.
Previous governors of Indian origin include Nikki Haley, who led South Carolina from 2011 to 2017. She was Sikh and later converted to Christianity. Another was Bobby Jindal, who served as governor of Louisiana from 2008 to 2016. He was Hindu and later converted to Christianity.
The controversy erupted after Ramaswamy's campaign released a video that was published in The Rooster, a newsletter focused on Ohio politics.
The video features a recording of Acton's mother, Donna Arthur, calling her daughter a "liar" and urging Ohio residents not to vote for her.
"She has lied her whole life. My daughter needs help, and if she needs help herself, she cannot help you," Arthur said.
However, the advertisement did not mention that Acton had accused her stepfather of sexually abusing her during childhood.
Ramaswamy argued that voters should listen to people who know Acton well, including her mother. He said he had never met Arthur and that she had not been paid for the advertisement.
Vice President JD Vance defended the advertisement on Wednesday, saying its message brought the reality to light and portrayed Amy Acton as a liar.
Vance, who previously served as a senator from Ohio, also sought to justify the television advertisement. He said he felt "a little disgusted" by criticism from members of his own party.
When the advertisement was released on Monday, it did not disclose who had paid for it or who was responsible for its publication. On Tuesday, however, Ramaswamy acknowledged that his campaign had released the advertisement and spent $4 million on it.
The admission immediately triggered sharp criticism from both parties. Haley, who campaigned against Ramaswamy during the 2024 Republican presidential nomination contest, called him a bad person.
Asked about the advertisement on Wednesday, US President Donald Trump said, "I know nothing about it. I heard that the mother had become very rebellious against her daughter."
He added, "It's a very unusual situation for a mother to hate her daughter so much. But I don't think it has anything to do with common sense."
The release of the video has brought the long-running dispute within Acton's family back into the spotlight.
In a post on X, Acton alleged that Ramaswamy's latest advertisement featured a person registered as a sex offender who had been sentenced to eight years in prison for having sex with a minor.
"By taking money from an Epstein associate and shaming me for my childhood, he has already shown that he doesn't care about survivors of sexual abuse," she wrote.
Acton described the advertisement as shameful and said she was not surprised by such conduct from someone like Ramaswamy.
Her campaign also released a separate video on Tuesday featuring her brother, Philip Stearns, discussing the abuse they experienced during childhood. In the video, Stearns said, "Amy always had to endure the most."
In the 30-second video, he added, "Vivek should be ashamed. He has contempt for Amy. He has contempt for Ohio."
According to documents, Acton was 12 when her stepfather was accused of raping her. A grand jury subsequently indicted him, according to the documents. He pleaded not guilty and left the state before the trial could take place. He died in Pennsylvania in 2004.
Acton has said that she last saw her mother when she was 12 years old. According to Acton, her mother remained with her husband until his death.
Her brother, Philip Stearns, has also corroborated her account.
According to the BBC, Acton and her brother were removed from their mother's custody in 1978 after their stepfather, Cladith Arthur, was arrested and charged.
In a statement, Stearns accused Ramaswamy of sinking to an extremely low level and described the attempt to turn child sexual abuse into a political issue as "disgusting."
Other Republican politicians, including candidates contesting elections for different state offices in Ohio, have also criticised the advertisement.
Ohio Senator Jon Husted, who is seeking re-election, told The Associated Press, "I would not have run that ad."
Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose also issued a statement criticising the advertisement. LaRose is contesting the election for state auditor.
Speaking to a television channel in Columbus, he said, "All I will say is that candidates have to be accountable for their ads. I probably would not run an ad like that, but every candidate has the right to make their own decision."
Attack advertisements targeting political opponents are not new in American politics. However, David Lublin, a professor at American University's School of Public Affairs, told the BBC that such advertisements had become more aggressive, with the boundaries of acceptable attack messaging expanding.
Lublin said using family members to target political opponents was also not unprecedented. He cited testimony from members of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s family before the confirmation of his appointment as health secretary.
However, he argued that the Ohio controversy was fundamentally different. "But this is on a completely different level. The distance between them is not about policies, but about an allegation of rape," he said.
Lublin believes that Trump's rhetoric and election campaigns have contributed to the growing coarseness of American political discourse. As an example, he cited an incident in which Trump mocked a disabled journalist in Ohio.
The controversy over Ramaswamy's $4 million advertisement has thus extended beyond the Ohio gubernatorial contest, prompting criticism from members of both parties and intensifying scrutiny of how candidates use personal and family disputes in political campaigns.
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