Vivek Ramaswamy: It appears that Vivek Ramaswamy’s ascent to prominence as a biotech entrepreneur has been reflected in his Republican presidential candidacy.
One of the wealthiest millennials globally and a political novice, Vivek Ramaswamy has run a fast-paced presidential campaign that has paralleled his explosive ascent to prominence as a biotech entrepreneur. He continually exudes the arrogance of a populist, self-declared outsider on everything from deporting people born in the United States to cutting off funding to Israel and Ukraine.
“I declare myself to be on the side of revolution.” “I’m going to lead that in a manner that no politician from the establishment can.”
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However, Ramaswamy has encountered doubters and occasionally harsh realities in business and politics that have threatened to derail his goals. The Republican primary in 2024 has been refocused on foreign policy because of the Israel-Hamas conflict, which has also revealed how much Ramaswamy’s self-declared revolutionary attitude divides him from many of the party’s influential members and supporters.
While backing Israel’s offensive during the main debate on Wednesday, Ramaswamy went back to his habit of making fun of rather than merely criticizing his opponents. “Do you want Dick Cheney in three-inch heels?” Ramaswamy taunted former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley and Florida governor Ron DeSantis, who some internet sleuths claim has lifts in his boots.
On stage, the performance was met with ridicule and eye rolls. The 51-year-old mother of two called Ramaswamy “scum” when he suggested Haley was being hypocritical in her criticism of the social media app TikTok because her daughter had used it in the past.
Ramaswamy, an Ohio native who resides there as well, has dazzled numerous audiences with his incisive, all-encompassing speech. However, even a few impressed Republican voters are not endorsing him. He is one of several candidates who poll in the mid- to high single digits behind former President Donald Trump and generally lag behind DeSantis in national surveys.
A GOP volunteer from Early, Iowa, Ann Trimble Ray, proposed that Ramaswamy “exposes his naivete in part with what he’s said about Israel, but also his inexperience.” Ray, who appears to be inclined to support Haley, stated, “Unless you’ve had the experience of someone who has had exposure to the briefings, what you communicate is a whole lot of conjecture.”
The 38-year-old immigrant son of Indians has lived his entire adult life acting like a haughty rescuer. To make a fortune in business, one had to hype a drug that didn’t work out in the end. In terms of politics, it entails claiming he can carry over Trump’s “America First” agenda into the White House.
Ramaswamy chose Harvard, a mainstay of the US establishment, as his university. Ramaswamy was a biology major who actively participated in the college Republican organization, where he stood out for being a libertarian. The college newspaper took notice of him because of his rapper persona, “Da Vek,” who performed with songs based on libertarian philosophy.
Ramaswamy told The Crimson, “I like to argue; I consider myself a contrarian.” Ramaswamy was first exposed to the hedge-fund class at Harvard. After serving as an intern at the most prominent Wall Street investment firm, Goldman Sachs, he was hired by Dan Gold, a fellow Harvard alumnus, at QVT Financial. Leading the company’s pharmaceutical investments was Ramaswamy.
In 2014, Ramaswamy started his own business. With a clear business plan in mind, he called it Roivant—a play on the acronym for “return on investment”—and bought cheap patents for medications that were shelved in the research and development stage and brought them back to life.
In his first significant action, Ramaswamy paid $5 million to GlaxoSmithKline through his firm Axovant for RVT-101, a prospective Alzheimer’s medication that had been undergone several trials before being determined to be insufficiently promising to move further with. When Axovant was still in its infancy, Ramaswamy rebranded it as “intepirdine” and told The New York Times that it was a “best-in-class drug candidate,” disregarding the earlier research. He ended up on Forbes magazine’s cover.
The excitement paid off. Never would intepirdine. The largest-ever biotech IPO at the time, Axovant’s 2015 IPO brought in $315 million, and the company was valued at around $3 billion. Axovant disclosed additional trial findings in 2017 that indicated the medication was not helpful in slowing the progression of Alzheimer’s disease. Axovant’s value plummeted.
However, Ramaswamy had amassed tens of millions by selling off shares whose value had increased due to widespread support. A Yale School of Management researcher who keeps tabs on Ramaswamy’s business activities, Jeffrey Sonnenfeld, stated, “He pumped up the image and the name so people invested, while he was selling out.” That is a quintessential “pump and dump.”
One of the 20 years’ worth of tax returns that Ramaswamy has released, from 2015, showed nearly $38 million in capital gains income. He used that to build a portfolio that is currently valued in the hundreds of millions, far beyond the $15 million he has contributed to his own campaign.
His primary criticism of corporate America’s emphasis on diversity, equity, and inclusion led him to become a conservative author and frequent guest on cable news. In that capacity and while running for office, Ramaswamy avoids mentioning the fact that some of his personal investments—Disney, a target for conservative criticism—are at the forefront of DEI initiatives. The idea that Ramaswamy is Donald Trump 2.0 is one he welcomes.
While on the campaign trail in Atlanta, Ramaswamy declared, “I think Donald Trump was an excellent president.” “However, I do think that in order to advance our America First agenda, we will need an outsider from a different generation who has a real positive vision.”
In the event that the former president is found guilty of federal offenses, such as those connected to the Capitol Hill attack in 2021, Ramaswamy has vowed to pardon him. In a previous book, Ramaswamy denounced Trump’s “abhorrent” actions and referred to January 6 as “a dark day for democracy”; he no longer makes these claims.
Although the children of illegal immigrants are U.S. citizens according to federal law and Supreme Court precedent, Ramaswamy supports deporting them. He challenges the official version of events on 9/11. He has demanded that 75% of federal employees be fired. He favors raising the voting age in the US.
Two days after 1,400 people were killed in an attack by Hamas on October 7, Ramaswamy proposed that the United States postpone help to Israel until its administration announced plans for Gaza. Even though a large portion of conservatives oppose foreign aid, Republican voters strongly support Israel.
A recent Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Research poll from November indicates that almost 4 out of 10 Republicans (44%) believe that the US’s present level of support for Israel in the conflict with the Palestinians is about right. Republicans make up 34% of those who feel that the United States doesn’t support them enough, while Democrats have the same opinion (9%).
Ramaswamy supported Israel’s right to strike back against Hamas during the debate on Wednesday, but he also stated that Americans shouldn’t be financially involved in the conflict. He chastised his rivals for portraying US assistance to Ukraine as a defense of democracy against Russian threat.
“I want to exercise caution so that I don’t repeat the mistakes made by the previous neocon elite. Millions were killed and trillions were spent by corrupt officials in both parties, he claimed. “Made billions for themselves in wars that killed thousands of our sons and daughters, people my age, in conflicts that didn’t serve everyone’s interests, adding $7 trillion to our national debt in places like Iraq and Afghanistan.”
Recently, Ramaswamy and right commentator Tucker Carlson got into a heated argument over Ramaswamy’s allegations of systematic corruption inside the American elite. Ramaswamy said he was misrepresented when the highly influential Fox News personality Sean Hannity questioned him following his interview with Carlson. Hannity shot back, saying, “You do this in every interview.” You make statements, but in your own words, you refute them.
Trump’s detractors claim he also does that. After the Hamas incident, the former president also ran afoul of prominent Republicans for disparaging Israel’s prime minister. Nevertheless, Ramaswamy has been left to take the blows that most contenders would never throw at the former president because Trump is still such a clear favorite to win the GOP nomination that he has skipped every debate.
Haley shot back on Wednesday, claiming that Putin and President Xi “would love” his isolationism and that they are “sucking up to the idea that someone like that could become president.” In a quick meeting earlier this year, Ramaswamy explained his basic approach to a 16-year-old who wanted guidance. Ramaswamy advised him to “find where the pack is going and then figure out what they missed.” “You must defy the general consensus.” He did, however, offer a caveat: “You have to be right.”
Frequently asked questions
Where did Vivek Ramaswamy get his money?
Subsequently, Ramaswamy claimed that his involvement in the biotech, pharmaceutical, and financial sectors had made him wealthy before he even attended Yale; in 2023, he claimed to have had a net worth of almost $15 million before he even finished law school. He made future US Senator J. D. Vance a buddy at Yale.
What is the networth of Vivek Ramaswamy?
Although it’s holding up better, his net worth is still declining. Ramaswamy’s current value is $880 million, down from his estimated $1.1 billion in late September.
What religion is Ramaswamy?
Although they concede that Ramaswamy’s Hindu faith presents a challenge, Iowa’s Christian leaders maintain that the impediment is not insurmountable.
What nationality is Vivek Ramaswamy?
Notwithstanding, Mr. Ramaswamy declared in a recent interview that he does not consider himself to be an Indian American. Following a campaign stop in Marshalltown, Iowa, he declared that being Hindu and Indian is “part of my cultural identity, for sure, and I’m proud of that and very comfortable with that.” “But first, I’m an American,”
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