October is known for disgusting political attacks, but we cannot be indifferent or tolerant.
The pro-Vivek Ramaswamy campaign ad featuring his opponent’s estranged mother calling her daughter a liar is despicable.
It’s likely to backfire, and it should. It’s amoral and should be a political disaster.
I saw the pro-Vivek ad with Amy Acton’s estranged mother this morning and did what I imagine a lot of people did — looked up who Donna Arthur is and what the backstory is. Acton refers to herself as a childhood sexual-abuse survivor and has talked about being homeless (including in a campaign ad of her own).
Her life story includes family-court battles. Acton’s brother says in a statement today that after Arthur’s husband “was arrested and Amy and I were removed from their custody, our birth mother stayed married to Amy’s rapist until he died.”
This is an all-too-common story: An adult who is not related to kids hanging around/living in the house abusing a child.
Common decency should dictate this being off-limits as a line of attack in a political campaign. And, yes, even with Acton making mention of it as part of her life story. (I see all kinds of questioning of the record online. Her positions and political record should be enough to challenge her. If political battle can’t be waged within those limits, the competency of your campaign should be in question.)
I quickly saw that Operation Rescue pulled the Donna Arthur card six years ago to make the case that Acton was unfit to be state health director. It added mental-health treatment to the mix to raise questions about her suitability. This kind of thing took away from the case against her then, and it does now.
A V-PAC ad over the summer used addiction and mental-health treatment against Acton.
It can be both true that medication is overprescribed in America and that more people who need help for mental-health challenges and addiction don’t get it because they are afraid and ashamed. Can we please not, in the heat of campaigning, add to that unhealthy culture, making things for people getting the help they need?
Commenters are going to be mad that I say anything that could hurt the Republican so close to Election Day. But every day we had better be more concerned about Judgment Day.
October is known for disgusting political attacks, but we cannot be indifferent or tolerant — this must be condemned.
I’m not clear on who paid for the ad, but Ramaswamy should say it’s disgusting and make clear that his opponent’s childhood sexual abuse — and addiction and mental-health history — is inappropriate content for a political ad, an ad that makes him look cruel and desperate.