“Leave it up!”: Trump says he told Vivek Ramaswamy to not take down Amy Acton attack ad despite criticism

Trump has made multiple headlines this week, after revealing at a campaign rally in Iowa that Vivek Ramaswamy had called him for advice over an attack advertisement that has put Ohio Republicans under considerable pressure. Ramaswamy, a biotech billionaire and former presidential candidate, is the Republican nominee for Ohio governor. The ad features Amy Acton’s estranged mother, who speaks out against the Democratic nominee in it. Several decades prior, she had lost custody of her children after her then-husband faced an indictment.

Trump told the Iowa crowd that he advised Ramaswamy to “Leave it up!”

“You’ve got to ride with it,” added Trump.

He also shared the precise words he says he gave Ramaswamy.

“I told him to leave it up and look upstairs and say: ‘Thank you, God, very much. I appreciate it,’” he shared.

“I only wish I could have had an ad like that against somebody,” he added.

(The opinions expressed above are Donald Trump’s own and do not reflect the position of the publication.)

Gov. Mike DeWine, who had backed Ramaswamy as his preferred successor, had already gone public with his criticism of the advertisement by Thursday. The backlash from within his own party only added to the pressure on Republicans as the midterm elections draw near.

Mike DeWine urges Ramaswamy to pull attack ad as Trump fires back with disloyalty accusation:

Gov. Mike DeWine addressed reporters at the Ohio state capital, calling the ad

“deeply, deeply troubling.”

As per The Associated Press, he made his position plain.

“It’s wrong to run this ad,” DeWine shared.

“I would just urge the Ramaswamy campaign to take this down,” the governor added.

Acton has shared publicly that she has not seen Donna Arthur for decades. As per a report shared by The Guardian, Arthur chose to remain with a man who had sexually abused Acton when she was twelve years old, even after police had stepped in.

The video had begun circulating on social media earlier in the week, before Ramaswamy’s campaign confirmed to Ohio media outlets that it was their own work. By later in the week, the campaign announced plans to spend four million dollars airing it across the state.

DeWine also noted that “family members have always historically been off limits,” pointing out that Acton had referenced Ramaswamy’s mother’s alleged involvement in a “pump and dump” scheme earlier in the year, though with considerably less prominence.

(The opinions and statements expressed above are those of the individuals quoted and do not reflect the position of the publication.)

DeWine faces disloyalty accusation from Trump as Vance and Ramaswamy’s campaign push back against critics:

On Truth Social Thursday afternoon, the president went further than his Iowa rally remarks. He took direct aim at DeWine, accusing the governor of being

“disloyal to the Republican party.”

The forty-seventh president did not hold back.

“He probably wants a Dumocrat to win, and certainly doesn’t want someone who will do a much better job than he is capable of doing,” Trump wrote.

(“Dumocrat” is retained as shared in the original quote to preserve the speaker’s intentional wording. The standard spelling of the word is “Democrat.” The quoted form reflects the speaker’s deliberate wordplay.)

He then doubled down on his support for the advertisement, adding,

“I suggested, on the other hand, that Vivek should keep it up, and let everyone listen to the mother of a defective, dishonest, and incapable candidate, explain how the daughter is a DISASTER who, uncontrollably, lies, cheats, and steals!”

Ramaswamy’s campaign also pushed back against its critics. Connie Luck, a spokesperson for the campaign, framed the backlash as a media double standard.

“We refuse to accept the media’s double standards when Democrats have regularly used family members of President Trump, RFK Jr, and other Republicans in ads. Voters shouldn’t buy it,” Luck said.

Vice-President JD Vance echoed a similar sentiment when he spoke to reporters in Cincinnati on Wednesday. He was blunt about where his concern lay.

“Whether the ad was appropriate or not is not really my concern,” Vance said.

“I’m a little bit disgusted when I see Republicans across the country who are whining more about that advertisement than they are about what the congressional Democrats and other Democrats want to do to the United States of America. Politics is a tough business,” he added.

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(The opinions expressed above are those of the individuals quoted and do not reflect the position of the publication.)

Acton’s campaign responded with a statement from her brother, Philip Stearns, who called the advertisement “a despicable low” for Ramaswamy. Stearns also noted that he and his sister had been removed from Arthur’s custody after their stepfather was arrested.

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