Source: yahoo.com for The New Republic 10/14/26
In September, Ohio GOP gubernatorial nominee Vivek Ramaswamy posted (and quickly deleted) a video on social media featuring himself shaking hands with a registered sex offender. He again featured that same man in a television campaign ad a month later, according to reporting from The Bulwark.
In 2006, Amherst, Ohio, resident Vernon Edwards pleaded guilty to “gross sexual imposition,” which according to Ohio law involves sexual contact with a minor. He was charged in a case involving a 13-year-old girl, though he faced many similar allegations against his nieces.
While Edwards didn’t have a speaking role in Ramaswamy’s commercial, he’s included in the B-roll footage as his wife Patty speaks about how the embattled gubernatorial candidate lowered her property taxes.
The Ramaswamy campaign said it had no prior knowledge of Edwards’s criminal history.
“This ad was based on a …
