Amy Acton’s birth mother went on camera to call the Ohio Democratic gubernatorial candidate a liar, and now the whole state, and frankly the whole internet, is talking about it. The minute-long video features Donna Arthur looking straight into the camera and telling Ohio voters not to make her daughter their next governor.
“My name is Donna Arthur, and I’m Amy Acton’s mother,” she says at the top of the clip. Arthur, who describes a background in child and family services, says she loves her daughter but believes Acton has been dishonest about her upbringing and her opponent. “She says she grew up living in a tent. None of that is true,” Arthur says flatly. Don’t let her become your governor.” When your own mom is cutting a campaign ad against you, you might want to rethink the strategy.
BOMBSHELL:
Ohio Democratic gubernatorial candidate Amy Acton’s own mother urges voters not to vote for her daughter.
“My name is Donna Arthur and I’m Amy Acton’s mother. I worked at Children and Family Service Association, building one of the first two sexual abuse programs in America.
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 says she grew up living in a tent. None of that is true. 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.”
That’s one hell of an October surprise.
— Walter Curt (@wcdispatch) October 20, 2026
Published accounts, including reporting from WKBN27, describe Acton’s childhood as unsettled. Her parents divorced when she was 3. She moved frequently with her mother, living in roughly 18 homes by age 12, and reportedly spent one winter in a tent at a campground before later moving in with her father. The video does not specify what exact statement of Acton’s prompted the “liar” accusation, and it does not disclose when it was made or who paid for it. Amy Acton Ohio governor race describes the video’s origins as unverified, with social media posts labeling it a political ad but no official campaign material confirming that. Newsweek noted it has not independently established whether Republican candidate Vivek Ramaswamy or his campaign was involved in producing or circulating the footage.
Acton’s brother Philip Stearns came out swinging in a statement to Newsweek, accusing Ramaswamy of exploiting his sister’s account of childhood sexual abuse for political gain and condemning the video as a personal attack. One post of the clip had already racked up more than 1.4 million views on X, with users calling it “brutal.” Politics is a rough business, but this one is a whole new level of family drama.
On the polling front, the race is genuinely competitive heading into November 3, when Ohioans choose a successor to term-limited Republican Governor Mike DeWine. An ActiVote survey of 400 likely voters put Ramaswamy at 51.4 percent and Acton at 48.6 percent, though the margin of expected error was plus or minus 4.9 points. A co/efficient poll showed Ramaswamy at 45 percent to Acton’s 43 percent, also within the margin of error. But two other polls, from Marist University and Bowling Green State University paired with YouGov, actually had Acton leading by 50 to 43 and 50 to 44, respectively. So nobody really knows where this thing lands.
The same Marist poll had some rougher news tucked inside for Ohio Republicans: Democrat Sherrod Brown led Republican Jon Husted 48 to 44 in the Senate race, and President Trump’s job approval sat at just 43 percent with 55 percent disapproving. Forty percent of likely voters said their congressional vote would be primarily a vote against Trump, nearly double the 21 percent who called it support for him. Ohio’s turning into quite the battleground, and now the Ohio Democratic gubernatorial candidate has to fight her opponent and, apparently, Thanksgiving dinner.
