Suspect arrested following incident with Dr. Amy Acton at Canfield Fair; multiple hurt

CANFIELD, Ohio (WOIO) - An armed Canfield man was arrested Sunday at the Canfield Fair after lunging at Ohio gubernatorial candidate Dr. Amy Acton and injuring multiple people, according to campaign officials and sheriff’s deputies.

Records show Patrick Havas, 38, of Canfield, has been booked into the Mahoning County Jail on two counts of assault and one count of disorderly conduct.

What Happened

Gerry Ricciutti, a spokesperson for the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Office, said Havas walked around 2:30 p.m. into a tent for the Mahoning County Democrat Party (MCDP) and was taking cellphone video of Acton.

As Acton spoke to a crowd pf people, Ricciutti said Havas pushed his way through them, knocking two to the ground.

Havas was confronted by Acton’s security detail, which included Ohio State Highway Patrol troopers, and was arrested by Canfield police officers.

Ricciutti said deputies recovered two guns and a set of brass knuckles following his arrest. However, he said Havas did not use the weapons during the incident.

The highway patrol will be handling the investigation.

Background and Reaction

Havas has a criminal history including three theft charges and traffic offenses, according to court records.

“Let me be clear - The Mahoning County Democratic Party (MCDP) abhors political violence in all forms. What happened at our tent today during today’s visit from Dr. Acton is reprehensible and should be condemned by leaders on all sides of the aisle,” the MCDP chair said.

The Ohio gubernatorial race is one of the most high-profile races this year as the campaigns enter the final six weeks of campaigning before the general election in November.

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine recruited Acton from Ohio State University, where she was an associate professor of public health, to lead the Ohio Department of Health in 2019. As the COVID-19 pandemic ramped up in early 2020, she was thrown into the state and national spotlight — becoming a source of comfort to many viewers of the governor’s daily news conferences.

For her service as health director, Acton earned the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation’s Profile in COVID Courage Award, the Columbus Foundation’s Spirit of Columbus Award and Ohio State’s highest alumni honor, the Alumni Medalist Award.

But her position as the face of the DeWine administration’s aggressive stance against the virus also earned Acton many enemies, among them Statehouse Republicans and average Ohioans who opposed pandemic restrictions.

She is “grateful for the swift and decisive action of law enforcement and are praying for the recovery of those injured. This kind of violence has no place in Ohio. Dr. Acton will always stand up to the chaos, hate and vitriol that pits us against one another,” said Addie Bullock, communications director for the campaign.

Acton is facing Republican Vivek Ramaswamy, who has parlayed his national name recognition, tech industry connections and alliance with President Donald Trump into a record fundraising haul that he is tapping for advertising spots aimed at the November election. He is using campaign rallies and advertising to criticize Acton, the state’s former public health director.

Ramaswamy called the incident Sunday unacceptable.

“Candidates should be able to meet with voters without having to worry about threats or violence. What happened today is completely unacceptable and has no place in politics, and we hope hope that no one was hurt,” Ramaswamy’s communications director, Connie Luck, said in a statement Sunday.

The fairground’s police department referred inquiries to the Mahoning County Sheriff’s Department, which didn’t immediately return a message seeking comment. The Ohio State Highway Patrol didn’t immediately respond to a request for information.

The incident brought condemnation from Ohio Republican Sen. John Husted, who said on X that he and his wife were “disturbed by the attempted attack on Amy Acton today at the Canfield Fair. We are grateful for law enforcement’s quick response. There is no place for this kind of behavior, and it must never be tolerated.”

Ohio Attorney General Andy Wilson expressed confidence in the highway patrol’s investigation and said, “The attempted violence directed at Dr. Acton is unacceptable — political violence of any kind has no place in Ohio or our nation. I am thankful she was unharmed, and my prayers are with those who were injured”

The country has seen a rise in political violence over the past decade. That includes the 2017 shooting at a Republican congressional baseball team practice in Alexandria, Virginia; the 2022 hammer assault on the husband of Democratic then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi in California; the 2024 assassination attempt on Donald Trump at a Pennsylvania rally during his presidential campaign as well as another on the president at this year’s White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in April; and the assassinations last year of a Democratic Minnesota state lawmaker and her husband and of conservative commentator Charlie Kirk in Utah.

Federal political committees spent more than $40 million on expenses labeled as security during the 2023-24 campaign cycle, the most recent one for which data is publicly available, according a report released in April from the Public Service Alliance, a nonpartisan group that focuses on security for public officials.

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Associated Press writers Ryan J. Foley in Iowa City, Iowa, and Kantele Franko contributed to this report.