The social media gubernatorial race is under way in Ohio

It’s campaign 2026 in Ohio, but anyone who doesn’t spend the majority of their time on social media might be forgiven for not realizing it.

At the moment, the campaign seems to be playing out primarily on social media and through campaign fact-checks.

By most objective measures, the race between Republican Vivek Ramaswamy and Democrat Amy Acton is close. The Cook Political Report moved it from leaning Republican to a toss-up.

Yet, both campaigns appear to be engaged in activities that align with their highly curated social media channels.

Even Cleveland.com couldn’t break through.

The publication reported that in response to “hundreds of readers,” it pressed Acton and Ramaswamy on “something they say is often missing from campaigns: direct answers to policy questions, not talking points.” However, neither campaign responded to “12 reader questions” the site’s reporter posed.

Acton released her first campaign ad, which the campaign said addresses her childhood experiences of abuse, homelessness and neglect. In a statement, Campaign Manager Philip Stein said, “This is personal for her; she knows what it’s like to struggle.”

What’s not immediately clear is how many ads might follow.

“This is the first ad in what is shaping up to be a multi-million dollar ad campaign,” the Acton campaign told Statehouse News Bureau in a statement.

Interestingly, rather than fully fleshing out her platform, the Acton campaign has sought to fact-check Ramaswamy’s claims.

In a late June release, the campaign fact-checked the statement purportedly from a super PAC: “And she admitted to police that she was drinking while taking drugs.”

At issue is a report that police were called to a “domestic dispute” at Acton’s house in 2019, while she served as the director of the Ohio Department of Health. As NBC reported, “She told officers she had been drinking, had taken an unknown amount of prescription drugs and was about to drive away in her car before her husband, who also told police he had been drinking, talked her out of it, the report stated.”

“There was absolutely no evidence that Dr. Acton was intoxicated,” the campaign said in its fact check. “Her husband is on record stating she had only one drink.”

The campaign called it “a clear sign of desperation from Ramaswamy’s campaign.”

Dakota Sawyer, CEO and founder of Statesman Limited, a lobbyist who works with Republicans but is not connected to the governor’s race, told Ohio.News that “repeating an attack line in order to rebut it, even to debunk it, still increases its exposure.”

“Audiences often remember the original claim longer than the correction,” Sawyer said. “Acton’s team is using a rebuttal sandwich, headline claim, quote, fact check, that forces every reader to re-encounter the original line multiple times in the same document. That is worth naming directly rather than just saying they are spinning it.”

Sawyer said the Acton piece is responding to new polling that shows her ahead, plus a ratings shift in her favor.

“If the argument is that she has peaked, that data needs to be addressed directly, or the piece reads like it is dodging inconvenient numbers,” Sawyer said. “The stronger version of that argument is not a flat assertion that she has peaked; it is that this polling reflects a soft or temporary ceiling for specific reasons. That forces an actual case to be built instead of asserted.”

Additionally, state Sen. Kent Smith, D-Euclid, took up the fight on Acton’s behalf. Following a report in the left-leaning Ohio Capital Journal, the lawmaker submitted a complaint and public records request with Ohio Secretary of State Frank LaRose’s office, alleging Ramaswamy’s campaign had “not itemized the expenditures it made with its campaign credit card from April 2025 to June 2026.”

Sawyer said the disclosure complaint “is a different kind of attack.”

“It is not a character hit,” Sawyer said. “It is a compliance complaint alleging the campaign has not disclosed the specifics of a large chunk of spending as Ohio law requires. Put together, this isn’t a policy-focused race yet. Neither piece engages substance. One is a personal conduct fact check, the other is a paperwork and transparency complaint.

“That is typical for this stage; four months out is still define-the-opponent season, not define-the-agenda season for most campaigns,” Sawyer added. “The sharper thesis isn’t that policy surprises are coming; it’s that both sides are currently fighting on character and compliance because neither wants to be first to plant a flag on cost of living or tax policy that the other can pick apart.”