Amy Acton’s birth mother urges Ohio not to elect her “liar” daughter for governor in a new ad, as the Democrat’s family says the fuller story is more jarring.
A video that surfaced online Tuesday features Donna Arthur looking into the camera and telling Ohio voters her daughter has a serious problem with the truth and should not become governor.
The spot lands in a competitive Ohio governor’s race where Democrat Amy Acton holds a narrow edge over Republican Vivek Ramaswamy, and it immediately drew a fierce response from Acton’s campaign and her brother, who say the ad dredges up childhood sexual abuse for political gain. Responsibility for producing the ad was not clear.
The New York Post reported the birth mother’s warning and the family’s counter-claims as the race already featured mudslinging from both sides.
In the video, Arthur does not say much about the Democrat who once ran Ohio’s health department.
Arthur said:
“I love my daughter, but when I saw her lying about her opponent, and it’s not easy for a mother to say this, but Amy has a serious problem. She is a liar. She lies about her past.”
She went further on one of Acton’s core biographical claims.
Arthur said:
“She says she grew up living in a tent. None of that is true.”
Arthur closed with a direct appeal to voters.
Arthur said:
“She’s lied her entire life. My daughter needs help, and she can’t help you if she needs help herself. People can change, but first they have to tell the truth, and my daughter still isn’t doing that. 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.”
Ohio Politics News account @OhioCrawler shared the full ad on X on October 20, 2026, calling it “nasty stuff from Ms. Arthur” and tying it to earlier talk that Ramaswamy had “co-opted” Acton’s estranged mother.
Acton’s campaign released a statement from her brother, Philip Stearns, that accused Ramaswamy of turning childhood abuse into a talking point and sketched a far darker family history than the ad acknowledges.
Stearns said:
“It’s not surprising that Vivek Ramaswamy has stooped to such a despicable low as to attempt to turn the sexual abuse Amy endured at twelve years old from our birth mother’s husband into a political talking point.”
He added that after the stepfather’s arrest, he and Amy were removed from custody, and that their birth mother “stayed married to Amy’s rapist until he died.”
Stearns also unloaded on the Republican personally, calling him “a pathetic excuse for a man who is willing to hurt anyone as long as it gets him what he wants.”
Those claims sit in direct conflict with Arthur’s account. Per the reporting, Arthur has accused Acton’s biological father, Jerry Stearns, of abusing her while she was pregnant with Amy and has described the rape and sexual-assault allegations against her husband Bud as a custody ploy by her ex. Primary court records, charge details, and case dispositions were not laid out in the available reporting.
Ramaswamy campaign spokesperson Connie Luck told The Post the campaign does not know what happened between Amy and her mother, who first spoke out about Amy in 2020, but insisted the public needs the information before Election Day.
Luck said:
“We don’t know what happened between Amy and her mother, who first spoke out about Amy in 2020, but we know that Amy Acton is a serial fabulist who has some serious problems with the truth that the public needs to be aware of before deciding who to entrust as governor.”
Luck added that “everyone who knows her best, her former boss, her former state colleagues, her fellow physicians, and now her own mother, are clearly warning Ohioans not to vote for her.”
Acton has already labeled Ramaswamy a “serial liar” and “scam artist” and has refused to debate him. Allies on the Republican side have sought to paint Acton as unstable and have insinuated an alcohol issue. Left-wing Ohio site The Rooster had earlier reported rumors that Ramaswamy’s allies planned to spotlight Arthur.
Acton has long treated her upbringing as political fuel. She has described herself as the product of an unexpected pregnancy, said her parents divorced when she was about three, and recounted time spent at a campground outside Youngstown, including at least one winter living in a tent.
In a 2019 interview with The Vindicator, Acton said custody “always went to the mom,” that her dad tried to get custody, and that she had “so many crazy stories.”
Acton said then:
“I spent so much time being scared as a kid, but also navigating the adult world.”
She also said she was “lucky that it got bad enough, because it got me out of there.” She has said the purported abuse by her stepfather led to criminal charges and his arrest, and that she and her brother were removed from custody. In 2020 she claimed Arthur also faced charges and that Arthur and the stepfather “skipped town and have not been heard from since.” Arthur’s 2020 comments are referenced by the Ramaswamy campaign but not fully detailed in the current reporting.
Acton later moved in with her biological father. She went on to helm the Ohio Department of Health from 2019 through 2020 before launching her gubernatorial bid.
RealClearPolitics’ latest aggregate of polls gives Acton a 3.7 percentage point edge over Ramaswamy. Ohio has elected just one Democratic governor, Ted Strickland, since 1990. That history makes every character question land harder in a race already heavy with personal attacks.
The ad itself does not settle the underlying disputes. Arthur calls the tent story false and brands her daughter a lifelong liar. Stearns says the mother remained married to the man he calls Amy’s rapist after the children were removed. Luck says voters should hear the warnings from people who know Acton best. No independent corroboration for either the abuse-and-hardship account or Arthur’s contrary version appears in the reporting, and it remains unclear whether the Ramaswamy campaign produced or paid for the spot.
Ohio voters are being asked to hand someone the governorship while her own mother and brother cannot agree on the basic facts of her life. A candidate who wants that job should be able to clear up her own record first.
