Acton, a physician who became a household name during Ohio’s early coronavirus briefings, is now facing a campaign that keeps dragging the pandemic’s legacy back into the argument about what government should and should not have done. With Republicans casting her as a symbol of restrictions from 2020, the race is being shaped not only by party history in Ohio, but also by how voters remember—and politicize—COVID-era decisions.
The Democratic nominee will be trying to overcome the fact that she is unopposed in her party’s primary and that the general election opponent is Republican Vivek Ramaswamy, who enters the contest with national name recognition and has described campaign spending that draws on his personal fortune. But beyond those conventional campaign challenges, Acton’s time as Ohio’s top public health official in the first wave of the pandemic has become the most combustible issue line in the race.
Acton’s record as Ohio’s public health director places her at the center of disputes over the restrictions Gov. Mike DeWine backed during the pandemic, including closing schools, shuttering businesses, and restricting sporting events. The criticism also extends to election-related changes made during the early phase of the crisis, when voting in the 2020 primary was suspended and later conducted by mail balloting.
Republican messaging in rallies and advertising has framed the issue as a choice about “liberty” versus “lockdowns,” using Acton’s pandemic role as the focal point. Ramaswamy, a front-running Republican, has also been accused by opponents of trafficking in dangerous “COVID ideology,” and his campaign has said it does not think voters will accept that framing. At events around Ohio, mention of Acton has drawn loud boos, and a Republican state Senate candidate, Zac Haines, asked a fundraising crowd whether voters were choosing “freedom” or “Fauci,” and “liberty” or “lockdowns.”
Acton’s campaign has responded by emphasizing public health work done alongside DeWine rather than treating the pandemic as a political fault line. In a statement, her campaign spokesperson Addie Bullock said Acton was “proud of the work she did alongside Governor DeWine to put public health over politics, save lives and keep Ohioans safe,” adding that it was “unfortunate” that Ramaswamy wanted to “play politics on this issue.”
The way Acton talks about her pandemic service also reflects how closely the past is being pulled into the present campaign. At Democratic events, she has carried the image of a cult hero from 2020, with supporters creating a Dr. Amy Acton fan club and fundraising-style memorabilia, but during this year’s travel she has sometimes avoided directly using the words COVID-19 or coronavirus when discussing her role. At one Democratic crowd in March, she told listeners, “I’m proud of Ohioans, because together we flattened that curve, we saved a lot of lives,” describing the moment as a tough time and pointing to cooperation during the crisis.
Acton’s defenders argue that her pandemic orders were grounded in health goals rather than politics, while Republican critics connect her to a broader political backlash to restrictions. The cluster’s reporting notes that orders Acton signed at DeWine’s urging have been a central line of criticism from Republicans and have drawn renewed attention as she seeks the state’s top office, which has been dominated by Republicans in recent decades. The reporting also cites DeWine’s own position that he told Acton to issue the health order and that “The decision was mine.”
The campaign focus on Acton’s COVID-era decisions also sets up a comparison that Republicans and Democrats both can point to from different angles. The reporting says Ramaswamy, who has moved to distance himself from earlier pandemic-era ties, and another prominent Republican candidate for this year’s midterm elections, both have their own connection to Ohio’s pandemic response history. As CEO of Roivant Sciences, Ramaswamy wrote that he worked with then-lt. governor Jon Husted as an adviser on COVID-19 during 2020, and Husted later became a U.S. senator candidate for reelection.
The reporting further says that Ramaswamy has supported vaccines during the pandemic, received one himself, and advocated mask-wearing, while also saying he did not support governments mandating those measures. It also says that he has described his stance as “nuanced” since entering politics in 2024 and that he has argued he supports getting the economy going again. In an interview quoted in the coverage, Ramaswamy said, “As a decision maker, you have to weigh the costs and benefits of your actions,” and added, “You can’t be unmoored from the data,” while saying he intends to hold Acton accountable for decisions he says shuttered Ohio businesses and schools and suspended voting in the 2020 primary, which the reporting says was ultimately conducted by mail balloting.
As the general election approaches, the COVID-era record is turning into more than a past chapter for both campaigns. For Acton, it is a defining public-health credential that voters can interpret as either protection or overreach; for Ramaswamy and Republican allies, it is a durable storyline about government action and the trust that voters placed—or withdrew—during the pandemic years.