Why We Need Dr. Amy Acton

Quit saying that the best gubernatorial candidate Ohio's had in a very long time "can't possibly win"!

Good evening, wonderful readers. It’s been quite a week, as I assured you that it was going to be in my last piece. I appreciate all the feedback from folks about the new fall semester and the fear and trepidation many of us in higher education are feeling right now. That said, it’s a new week and a new topic for me to write about—let’s talk about Dr. Amy Acton!

Who is Dr. Acton, you may ask? She’s a candidate for governor in the great state of Ohio, and she has a pretty decent chance to pull it off. I’m hopeful that you’ll look at some of my arguments for her and let them soak in your brain for a bit before committing to get on board with me. We’re going to have to work hard to make this happen, despite all the reasons why I feel Dr. Acton is obviously the Governor that Ohio needs, particularly at this point in our tumultuous history as a state and as a nation.

(photo credit to Ohioans for Amy Acton)

So here, in no particular order, are some of the reasons why you should be throwing your resources behind Dr. Acton’s campaign:

• She knows what it’s like to have to work hard to get somewhere in life.

  As a child, she and her brother bounced between unstable housing situations for a while, until moving in with her father. She has experienced food insecurity. She has experienced what it’s like to put herself through college and medical school without financial support. She has earned everything she’s got, and that makes her someone worth fighting for (since she knows how to fight for both herself and you).

• She knows what it’s like to be a trend-setter and ground-breaker.

  Dr. Acton completed the first ever residency rotation in child advocacy at Children’s Hospital. She was this state’s first female Public Health Director. She even won an award for her teaching while working as a professor at Ohio State, along with a Profile in COVID Courage award from the JFK Library. USA Today also named her Ohio’s Woman of the Year for her hard work at the start of the pandemic.

• She has extremely high polling numbers for this point in the race.

  You may have seen this (or perhaps not), but she’s polling at a statistical tie with Vivek at this point, more than a year out from the election. Her favorability ratings are extremely high, and when Ohio voters are asked whether they’d trust a physician, a politician, or a billionaire most relate to them, they overwhelmingly choose the medical doctor.

• She’s got strong bipartisan credentials.

  Don’t forget that Governor DeWine (a Republican) appointed her to his cabinet in 2019, a time that wasn’t exactly devoid of political polarization. Her appeal extends across all kinds of populations, and she has worked with both conservative and liberal stakeholders to try and promote principles of good health in this state and beyond. Almost 20% of Republicans approve of the job she did as public health director, which is huge. She’s doing really well so far in polls of the all-important independent voters, too.

• She is an extremely accomplished professional.

  Dr. Acton has worked in the public sector, the nonprofit sector, and everywhere in-between. She has a background in advocacy and public health, and has completed a medical residency. She has worked hard for marginalized communities (especially related to unhoused youth and women’s health issues).

• She is a great public speaker.

  Everywhere she goes, she wows audiences with her presence, her knowledge, and her heart. She is an enormously impressive speaker—look for examples of her speeches online and you’ll be surprised. She’s getting big crowds, too.

• She has lived and worked in Ohio for her entire career, and is a “normal” person.

  Dr. Acton is a regular Ohioan, and she understands what the average Ohioan is going through. She’s not a billionaire, she hasn’t enriched herself at the expense of others, and she hasn’t distanced herself from it means to be from here.

• She has a great sense of empathy, a ton of intelligence, and plenty of grit.

  When I consider the qualities that I want to see in the chief executive of my home state, these absolutely fit the bill. Dr. Acton knows what it’s like to live in poverty, and she’s also been a trusted voice in the chambers of power down in Columbus. She knows how to talk to all kinds of people, and that includes not talking down to them. She’s also got a history of being brave even when she has unpopular opinions.

• What are the reasons why folks in the random comments sections on the Internet tend to give for why she cannot win (or why you shouldn’t support her candidacy)? Again, in no particular order (along with my rebuttals for each):

• Ohio has never had a female governor.

  You’d know this one wasn’t accurate if you were a regular reader of this newsletter. Don’t forget about Governor Hollister’s historic 11 days in office back in the late 90s! On a more serious note, though, nothing that seems “normal” to us got that way without happening for the first time at some point. There is no such thing as inevitability in politics or in the world, and defeatist attitudes related to a particular candidate’s demographics are stupid. Stop perpetuating nonsense.

• A Democratic candidate isn’t going to win anyway.

  Ohio has had plenty of Democratic governors! Not in a few years, sure, but it hasn’t been so long that you should decide it can never happen again. See my point above—believing that only Republicans can ever win statewide office in Ohio ONLY BENEFITS REPUBLICANS. Don’t be stupid—you’re not a stupid person, so stop perpetuating stupid ideas. If enough people vote for Dr. Acton, she’ll win. It’s that simple.

• Tim Ryan should run instead.

  Tim Ryan has some fans, sure. At the same time, he doesn’t have a winning record in recent years, and there are enough liberal-leaning folks in Ohio who he has rubbed the wrong way for a while that I’m doubtful of his statewide appeal. Name recognition does not equal trust or favorability, especially in this case! I cannot tell you how frustrated I get when random commenters say “Have Dr. Acton be Tim Ryan’s Lieutenant Governor!” Do you even realize how misogynistic you sound right now, bro? Tim Ryan is far from the ideal gubernatorial candidate, and when compared to Dr. Acton, he pales in comparison. Public polling also shows that she’s beating Tim Ryan by double digits in likely primary voters. Enough said.

• She can’t get elected because nobody’s going to donate to her campaign.

  Actually, Dr. Acton has raised more money from more individual donors than any Democratic gubernatorial candidate in the history of the state. Look it up! People are enthusiastic about this race, and about Dr. Acton, and she’s got a great shot at continuing to be a strong fundraiser moving forward.

• But—but—someone else might run instead.

  Who is this mythical unicorn of your ideal gubernatorial candidate? Show me a better person to take on Vivek Ramaswamy—show me more of a contrast between two people than between the two of them. I’ll wait. Sherrod Brown was the big question mark, and he’s already announced his run for U.S. Senate. The two of them have been doing joint fundraising in recent days, and will be a very strong ticket together. They’ll both benefit from each other being in their respective races, but nobody else is coming along who would do a better job than Dr. Acton. It’s time to get off the fence and support someone, not wait for your daydream to pop up out of nowhere.

• But Matt, I heard she can’t win!

  Read this newsletter from David Pepper and tell me that you still believe she cannot win.

• And when we compare her to her main opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, here are some reasons why he’s the worst possible choice:

• Vivek (as previously stated in this newsletter) is a huge scam artist.

  He has made his fortune from defrauding the public, including by having his psychiatrist mother conduct a study on an Alzheimer’s drug that they already knew didn’t work, and then highly publicizing her results so they could make a lot of money on an IPO (and then losing half that money when it was revealed that the drug didn’t do what they claimed).

• Vivek clearly looks down on the vast majority of Ohio’s citizens.

  He is a billionaire, and acts like it (including renting his own jet from himself so he can fly repeatedly from city to city in Ohio instead of driving like an actual Ohioan).

• Vivek has shown a long history of caring about himself, and only himself.

  Over and over, his professional career has provided us with plenty of examples of him choosing to enrich himself at the expense of everyone around him.

• Vivek spent around $6,000 per vote he received for his Presidential campaign.

  Spending at that rate in this race would cost him many, many billions of dollars, which even he doesn’t have to spare. We don’t need a governor who’s this bad at handling money. Does it really matter if he’s out-fundraising Dr. Acton, if he is blowing through money at the rate that he’s accustomed to?

• Vivek is committed to peddling snake oil and perpetuating conspiracy theories. Just based on principle, why would we want to encourage behavior like this? Examples abound of all the horrible things he has said and advocated for—just do a quick search and you’ll see that this is not the man who should be in charge of managing our state.

• Vivek encourages racism, jingoism, and is an all-around terrible human being. He brings out the worst, most virulently gross elements of Republicanism in folks. Don’t reward that behavior. We need to move as far as possible away from this man and everything he stands for.

I’ve saved one point for last, because I think it’s truly an important conversation to have. In fact, it’s one of my main reasons for writing this newsletter in the first place. That’s right, let’s talk about COVID-19.

Dr. Amy Acton had been Ohio’s public health director for about a year when the pandemic first reared its ugly head. She worked with Governor DeWine to direct our state’s public health response to the virus, which won accolades across the state, the nation, and the world for its decisiveness and willingness to put people and science first. As the pandemic became more politicized and as the dead-eyed march of late-stage capitalism prioritized supply chains and the easy access to buying stuff rather than actually caring about human beings, things got tougher. Dr. Acton opted to step down from her role (after being pressured to sign a public health order which would have caused her to break the Hippocratic Oath, due to her knowledge that it would harm people). This was a difficult choice, but she prioritized her medical ethics over the pressure which was being put on her (which was truly admirable). In addition, who can forget the time period when truly awful human beings began to threaten her family’s lives for advocating for policies which were borne out by her lifelong public health expertise. And who could blame her for wanting to maintain her ethical standards? It’s worth pointing out that she continued to get very high marks for her performance while in office from the average Ohioan for years after the fact, and that those high marks continue to the present.

The reason I want to talk about COVID-19 now, in August of 2025, is because you need to hear this: Dr. Acton will not lose this race as a result of the state’s public health response to the start of the pandemic, five years ago. That’s ridiculous. If she loses, it’ll be because of all kinds of other factors—some of which we know about, and others that will only become clear in hindsight, like with every single election in history.

The very fact that anyone at all is putting such a high premium on Dr. Acton’s lack of electability as a result of her connection to COVID-19 is indicative of a huge issue facing us as a society. A few facts for you:

1. COVID hasn’t gone anywhere. We aren’t “post-COVID”. Plenty of people continue to get sick and die every single day as a result of this virus, and pretending it has ceased to exist verges on delusional behavior.

2. If you are saying “only people with pre-existing conditions get seriously sick from this virus anymore”, then you’re ignoring the fact that nearly every American has some sort of pre-existing condition. You’re talking about yourself, you just don’t realize it.

3. If you care about social justice and issues which impact marginalized communities, then why wouldn’t you acknowledge the fact that communities of color and folks in poverty have been disproportionately harmed by the impacts of the pandemic? Solidarity means trying to minimize the continued effects of the virus on these communities. Yes, still.

This is absolutely a topic I have plenty more to say about, but this will have to do for now. If you choose to overlook an incredible gubernatorial candidate who could do an incredible job for the people of this state on the basis of the argument that a physician and public health expert shouldn’t have acted like a physician and health expert when placed in a position to utilize her expertise, then you’re not as smart as you think.

It’s 9:45pm on a Thursday night, and I’m worn out from the demands of the week. But I couldn’t let another installment of What We Can go by without making my case for Dr. Amy Acton—I sincerely believe that any potential downsides to her candidacy are more than balanced out by her incredible history, stellar personal qualities, and proven track record of leadership. Dr. Acton is the best candidate for governor in this state within my lifetime, and I can’t wait to see her win this thing. That’ll only happen with your money, your time, and your conversations with your family, friends, co-workers and neighbors. This state is too special to let it continue to move in the wrong direction. The Ohio Republican Party has held most statewide offices for the past twenty years. If Vivek Ramaswamy’s argument that it’s time to move Ohio toward the future made any sense at all, then this state’s voters need to examine who, exactly, has kept us from that better future. I think you can guess the answer to that.

I appreciate you reading, sharing, and thinking about the random topics that keep rattling around my brain. Writing this newsletter has quickly become one of my favorite parts of each week—even in the midst of such a busy season in my life, it’s a real source of respite for me. Thanks for valuing what I have to say, even occasionally.

Take care!