A week before Americans went to the polls and flipped a historic number of U.S. House seats, U.S. Senate seats and governor seats to the Democrats, Amy Acton said human decency was on the ballot.

“Kindness is a fierce commitment to justice and seeing the humanity and the God in one another,” Acton told a crowd of supporters gathered at Liberty High School in Youngstown, Ohio, in late October. “That and human decency are absolutely on the ballot.”

She was responding to the now-infamous attack ad from Vivek Ramaswamy, her failed Republican opponent for Ohio governor, featuring Acton’s estranged 82-year-old mother calling Acton a liar. As children, Acton and her brother were removed from their mother’s custody when she chose to remain with her husband, their stepfather, after he was indicted for repeatedly raping Acton over the course of two years.

Vice President JD Vance told critics to “stop whining” when they repudiated the ad. President Donald Trump said the ad was like “hitting pay dirt.”

Ohioans felt otherwise.

Acton’s victory was part of a stunning sweep to power for Democrats across America. Texas, North Carolina, South Carolina, Ohio and Georgia turned blue. Republican........

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