COLUMBUS, Ohio — A candidate running to be Ohio's Republican nominee for governor has a new social media video targeting frontrunner Vivek Ramaswamy — and it is raising concerns due to racist language and the use of a weapon.
Caution: Some may find language in this report to be offensive.
Ohio Republican gubernatorial candidate Casey Putsch can be seen entering the frame in a video he posted on X.
"Hey Vivek, you want to play Cowboys versus Indians?" Putsch can be heard saying before firing a gun three times.
He then goes on to say, "Don't worry, it's feather, not dot," using discriminatory words to differentiate between an indigenous person and an individual from India. Dot, referring to a bindi that some Hindus, Jains and Buddhists wear.
"One hundred percent, it's a threat," Case Western Reserve University religion and philosophy professor Dr. Deepak Sarma said.
Sarma was horrified to see Putsch targeting GOP frontrunner Vivek Ramaswamy using racist language and a weapon.
"This person is perpetuating, is fueling xenophobia in the United States," Sarma said. "And he's doing it in the most egregious way possible."
In an interview, Putsch claimed he wasn’t being racist, nor threatening.
"I am also supporting the Second Amendment and exercising my First Amendment right to make a joke that lots of people think is actually funny," Putsch said.
People are being sensitive, Putsch said, and he posts a lot on social media that "shouldn’t be taken seriously." He posts about Indian people like Ramaswamy routinely, saying to deport all of them — including his fellow candidate.
"How would that be racist? Because there are people that should be deported to all different places of the globe, and just because we might joke about deporting Vivek, how does that have anything to do with race, other than the fact that he's questionably American, and that's a funny joke too," Putsch said.
"How is he questionably American? He was born in Cincinnati," I responded.
"Yeah, he was born to Indian foreign nationals who came here just to have an anchor baby," Putsch said.
Ramaswamy stated that his parents immigrated legally, and his mother is a naturalized citizen. His father never took the citizenship test, he said in 2023.
Dehumanizing comments have been common in politics, Sarma said, and policies like mass deportations have been embraced by the Republican Party and Ramaswamy.
RELATED: Vivek Ramaswamy deleted social media heading into the Ohio governor's race. Here's why
Ramaswamy has also supported ending birthright citizenship for U.S.-born children of undocumented immigrants, he said in 2023.
"There is some irony to this, in that he has supported these positions, and he's supported [President Donald] Trump, and he supported Trump's rhetoric, and it has come back to bite him," Sarma said.
Ramaswamy's team declined to comment, but his running mate, Senate President Rob McColley, addressed general racism and violence in politics. We were unable to ask explicitly about the attack on Ramaswamy, and McColley couldn't comment directly on it due to rules around discussing campaigns while on the Senate floor.
"I think it doesn't matter what party you're in. We've seen political violence happen, pftentimes, we've seen that on the left. We've seen it in some cases on the right," McColley said. "Political violence should be condemned at every level."
Not only does this type of rhetoric need to be condemned, Sarma said, but Republicans need to work with each other to combat racism.
Hot water
Putsch explained that an event location had canceled on him after agreeing to host a Columbus fundraiser.
La Chatelaine, a French bistro, apologized to customers and the community for having agreed to host him. They canceled the event after they were made aware of his "pro-Nazi opinions and beliefs," the restaurant said on Facebook.
Our story featuring Putsch from January delved into previous comments Putsch had made about the Holocaust, Adolf Hitler and Jewish people.
RELATED: Who is Casey Putsch? Meet the GOP candidate challenging Vivek Ramaswamy for Ohio governor
In our interview, we questioned him about his comments that Hitler had some good decisions and beliefs.
Putsch had also faced controversy online after he announced a "beer hall rally." In connection with his last name, online users linked it to Hitler's failed coup to overthrow the German government, known as the 'Beer Hall Putsch.'
Putsch said he couldn't help that he was German and had a German last name.
But double entendrees aren't unheard of for Putsch, as he himself noted in his Cowboys versus Indians remark.
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