Amy Acton’s Brother Fires Back With Attack Ad After Mother Calls Her a Serial Liar

Adriana Stone 0 2 min read

Amy Acton’s Brother Responds After Mother’s Attack Ad

Ohio’s governor’s race has turned into a deeply personal family fight. Democratic candidate Amy Acton’s campaign has answered a blistering ad from Republican Vivek Ramaswamy with a video featuring Acton’s brother, Philip Stearns.

Ramaswamy’s campaign ad featured Donna Arthur, Acton’s mother. Arthur urged Ohio voters not to support her daughter and accused Acton of repeatedly lying about her past. She also described Acton as a sick person who needed help.

Arthur said, “I love my daughter, but when I saw her lying about her opponent — it’s not easy for a mother to say this, but Amy has a serious problem.”

She added that “she lies about her past,” and “she’s lied her entire life.”

Arthur’s warning to voters was direct: “Don’t vote for people who lie. Don’t let her become your governor. If you think she’ll make your life better, you’re fooling yourself. It will only get worse.”

Acton’s campaign responded with a statement from Stearns attacking Ramaswamy and accusing their mother of being complicit in alleged sexual abuse Acton faced as a child. The statement accused Ramaswamy of an “attempt to turn the sexual abuse Amy endured at twelve years old from our birth mother’s husband into a political talking point.”

Acton’s campaign later released a video ad in which Stearns again argued that Ramaswamy was exploiting painful family allegations for political gain. Ramaswamy’s ad did not mention abuse. Instead, it focused on Arthur’s criticism of her daughter. Arthur had also previously accused Acton, in 2020, of exaggerating or inventing stories about her childhood.

In the response video, Stearns described his own experience and said Acton had suffered more. Stearns said: “I received a lot of abuse, but Amy always got the worst of it. She continued to receive that abuse because she knew she had to protect me from that, and that if she hadn’t done that, who knows where I would have ended up? And she was 11 and 12 years old, and to think that that’s somehow a talking point, shame on Vivek.”

Stearns concluded by accusing Ramaswamy of holding contempt for Acton and Ohio and saying he was not fit to lead.

Ramaswamy defended the ad during an interview. He confirmed that it came from his campaign and said Arthur had not been paid. He also criticized Acton for refusing to debate him and for what he called defamatory attacks against him and his family.

“The thing that I want to say is that I would love for this race and this election to be about the substantive issues that impact Ohioans, and unfortunately, Amy Acton has been hiding from those issues. She won’t debate me, she doesn’t allow cameras at her events, and I think her record of continuously, certainly during this campaign, I would say spreading some defamatory, disparaging lies about me and my family, that does deserve to be scrutinized,” Ramaswamy said.

Ramaswamy also addressed whether Arthur had been compensated. “I’ve never met Amy Acton, which is a regret. I wish I’d met at least my opponent. I’ve also never met her mother. She was not compensated. I asked my team that question because we’ve got the question. She was not compensated.”

Ramaswamy also shared a clip from Megyn Kelly that highlighted what Kelly described as Acton’s history of lies, including an “armed attack” hoax at a campaign event, possible alcohol abuse around her own children, and what the clip called “COVID hysteria.”

Ramaswamy posted: “@megynkelly exposes the truth about Amy Acton. It’s uncomfortable, but every voter in Ohio should watch every second of this,”

The exchange has shifted the Ohio contest toward a personal dispute over Acton’s family history and the allegations made by both sides. Acton’s campaign says Ramaswamy is exploiting family trauma. Ramaswamy says voters deserve to examine Acton’s record and the accusations surrounding her campaign.

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