\n<\/p>\n
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) \u2014 Ohio has a contested Republican primary for governor fast approaching, but there are few signs that the top candidate sees it as a competitive race.<\/p>\n
Vivek Ramaswamy has parlayed his national name recognition, tech industry connections and alliance with President Donald Trump into a record fundraising haul that he is tapping for advertising spots aimed at the November election. He is using campaign rallies and advertising to criticize his would-be general election opponent, Democrat Amy Acton, the state\u2019s former public health director.<\/p>\n
Ramaswamy feels so assured of gliding through the May 5 primary that his campaign has all but ignored his GOP opponent so far.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe this year we face the single greatest contrast between two candidates in the history of governor’s races in Ohio,\u201d he told Republicans at a recent party fundraising dinner, referencing the general election. \u201cWe face the most consequential election for governor in the history of our state.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nonetheless, the primary season has exposed potential vulnerabilities for the 2024 presidential candidate.<\/p>\n
Ramaswamy faces growing headwinds within a GOP base disgruntled over the rising cost of living, the disjointed release of the Jeffrey Epstein files, the burgeoning demands of data centers and the war with Iran. Ramaswamy is also under criticism for some of his proposals, such as consolidating the state’s university system and raising the voting age to 25. Critics say those ideas suggest the Ivy League-educated biotech billionaire is out of touch with average Ohioans.<\/p>\n
The criticism has veered into the personal, surfacing as ethnic and racial animosity toward Ramaswamy, a child of Indian immigrants.<\/p>\n
If Ramaswamy is the nominee, his supporters worry less that Republicans will switch sides and vote for a Democrat than about the factors that could depress conservative turnout. If enough voters stay home in the fall, Ohio could see its first Democratic governor in 20 years.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have three opponents right now in this race,\u201d Ramaswamy\u2019s running mate, state Senate President Rob McColley, said in remarks to Republicans in rural Marion County that were shared by WGH Talk. \u201cWe have Amy Acton, we have the national political environment and then we have complacency. I would argue the third opponent is the most dangerous opponent we possibly have.\u201d<\/p>\n
Discontent among a segment of Ohio\u2019s conservative voters is being funneled into curiosity about Casey Putsch’s campaign.<\/p>\n
An engineer and vehicle designer who calls himself \u201cThe Car Guy,\u201d Putsch has attracted fans with provocative YouTube videos that troll Ramaswamy and criticize national Republicans over their handling of the Epstein files, positions on energy-guzzling data centers and support for Israel.<\/p>\n
His events are sparsely attended and his campaign has raised only $123,000, but Putsch has won over some conservative voters. Tyler Morris, an ambulance manufacturing worker from central Ohio, is among them.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I hear people like Casey speak, he\u2019s a guy like me,\u201d Morris, 32, said as he was on his way to see Putsch speak at a Columbus park. \u201cHe\u2019s just a guy that got pissed off one day. He\u2019s not a politician. He\u2019s like, do you know what — I want to speak for the average, everyday Ohioan.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morris said he used to support Trump, but has since soured on him and will not back a candidate endorsed by the president, as Ramaswamy is.<\/p>\n
\u201cI say I\u2019m politically cynical, because it\u2019s just like regardless of who I vote for, I feel like as an average Ohioan, it seems like things are just getting worse and worse for everyone,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Putsch\u2019s messaging has gone beyond the pitch to make life better for working-class Ohioans. He has been accused of contributing to the spread of ethnic hatred toward Ramaswamy, including repeatedly taking issue with the candidate’s Indian heritage and Hindu faith.<\/p>\n
As he was beginning his campaign, Putsch said Ramaswamy had contempt for \u201cAmerican cultural values.\u201d In one online video, he called for Ramaswamy to \u201cbe destroyed.\u201d<\/p>\n
The day after Putsch’s launch, a Ramaswamy opinion piece in The New York Times asked Republicans to reject the far-right, white nationalist element within the Republican Party in favor of a vision of American identity \u201cbased on ideals.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo matter your ancestry, if you wait your turn and obtain citizenship, you are every bit as American as a Mayflower descendant as long as you subscribe to the creed of the American founding and the culture that was born of it,\u201d he wrote. \u201cThis is what makes American exceptionalism possible.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ramaswamy, who was born and raised in Cincinnati, followed up the column by rebuking racism and antisemitism within Trump’s \u201cMake America Great Again\u201d movement during a speech at Turning Point USA\u2019s AmericaFest, angering some members of his party.<\/p>\n
Amid the fallout from that speech, Ramaswamy\u2019s social media posts were drawing increasingly ugly and racist reactions. Putsch also has pushed racial epithets, including depicting Ramaswamy as a stink bug he is spraying with insecticide and challenging him to a game of \u201ccowboys and Indians.\u201d<\/p>\n
In January, Ramaswamy announced he was getting off Instagram and the social media site X.<\/p>\n
\u201cLeaders who depend on social media to gauge public opinion are looking through a broken mirror,\u201d he wrote in a Wall Street Journal column.<\/p>\n
Putsch mocked Ramaswamy for the decision, posting to X that his rival \u201ccan\u2019t take the heat.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Ohio Republican Party chairman, Alex Triantafilou, dismisses Putsch’s attacks as typical for a primary election.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe online right these days, it\u2019s meaningless to the message of where we are as a party on the ground,\u201d Triantafilou said.<\/p>\n
He cited Ramaswamy’s national profile, his political skills and his fundraising prowess \u2014 a record $50 million in total contributions, though roughly half is from Ramaswamy’s own fortune.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn every possible category of what we want in a candidate, he has it,\u201d Triantafilou said.<\/p>\n
Aaron Baer, president of the Columbus-based Center for Christian Virtue, also rejects Putsch’s disparagement of Ramaswamy’s background, including questioning Ramaswamy’s ability to lead \u201ca Christian state.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bottom line is Vivek Ramaswamy, while he doesn’t share the Christian faith with me and millions of other Ohioans, he very much shares our values,\u201d Baer said.<\/p>\n
Ramaswamy has been running what looks like a general election campaign, drawing impressive crowds during visits to each of Ohio\u2019s 88 counties. His strategy appears to be working for voters like Pam Koch, a 70-year-old pharmacy worker who attended a Lincoln Reagan Day dinner where Ramaswamy was the featured speaker.<\/p>\n
Koch described herself as an anti-abortion Christian and said she came to the event \u201cjust to see where he stands, you know, spiritually and (on) everything that we value.\u201d Afterward, she said she was delighted with what she heard.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think he lines up with all of our values, so I\u2019m excited about that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Ron Eckles, a retired communications worker, is sticking with Putsch, partly for qualities the candidate shares with Ramaswamy, such as being a native Ohioan and building his own business. But he believes Putsch is stronger on gun rights and likes that Putsch is an Ohio State University alumnus; Ramaswamy attended Harvard and Yale.<\/p>\n
Putsch’s stark financial disadvantage in the primary doesn’t bother him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI believe in miracles,\u201d Eckles said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n