‘EXTREMELY RISKY’

Scott Jennings Blasts Vivek Over MAGA’s Vilest Ad

“It was bad strategy,” the conservative commentator told Kaitlan Collins.

Conservative commentator Scott Jennings has blasted MAGA candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s decision to release a twisted election ad attacking his opponent in Ohio’s gubernatorial race.

In a 60-second ad, Trump-endorsed Ramaswamy targeted Democrat Amy Acton, whom he is losing to in the polls.

In the election ad, which is still running, Acton’s estranged mother, Donna Arthur, accuses her daughter of being a “liar” and says she “needs help.”

The pair have been estranged since 1978, when Acton was just 12 and accused her stepfather, Cledith Arthur, of sexual abuse. Donna stood by her husband. The case never reached a trial; Arthur fled the state and remained a fugitive until his death in 2004.

On Thursday’s edition of CNN’s The Source with Kaitlan Collins, Jennings said that “morals” aside, the controversial attack ad will likely hurt Ramaswamy’s chances of being elected.

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“It‘s a very close race. I‘ve talked to a lot of Republicans in Ohio who think over the last two weeks, things have actually been moving in the right direction,” Jennings told host Collins.

“The Republicans are tracking the right way. And when you launch something like this, that‘s so incendiary and has the capacity to and probably will blow up in your face, it’s an extremely risky political strategy,” he said.

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Polling in Ohio’s race for governor to replace outgoing Governor Mike DeWine shows Ramaswamy, 41, slightly behind Acton, 60.

“Take the morals out of it. Take the subject matter out of it for just a minute, I look at it as just a risk that is highly likely to fail… I think for a lot of reasons, it was bad strategy,” Jennings went on.

“Now, whether you should pull it down and back down from it, does that make it worse? These are all questions the campaign would have to debate, but I would never have put this up in the first place, because I‘m not sure it‘s actually going to help him win. And of course, the case against using it is very strong,” he added.

The Daily Beast has contacted a representative for Ramaswamy for comment.

Acton has called the twisted campaign ad “despicable.”

“I’ve never attacked his family. I would never do that,” Acton said of her opponent. “You can see that there are so many people who have experienced trauma and abuse in their lives.”

Meanwhile, President Donald Trump, 80, advised Ramaswamy that “you gotta ride with it.”

“Leave it up, and look upstairs and say, ‘Thank you God, very much,’” Trump said at a rally in Iowa on Thursday,

Vice President JD Vance downplayed bipartisan backlash to the ad.

“When I see Republicans, people in my party, reacting so strongly, especially elected officials, have the opinion you want to have on that ad,” Vance told reporters during a press briefing in Ohio on Wednesday.

“If you think it was too tough, say it was too tough. If you think it wasn’t tough enough, say that. But I have to admit that 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.”

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Isabel van BrugenFreelance Writer

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