Politics

Ramaswamy Considers Trump A Friend And ‘Inspiration’ — But Says He’s The One Who Can ‘Actually Deliver’

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• Vivek Ramaswamy, the third GOP candidate to enter the 2024 presidential race, calls former President Trump a friend who he respects a lot, and even draws “inspiration” from, he told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview.
• While Ramaswamy says former President Trump cares a lot about national unity, he believes he will be the one to bring the country together.
• “I think we both care about national unity, the question is which of us can actually deliver it,” said Ramaswamy. 

Vivek Ramaswamy, the newest 2024 GOP hopeful, considers former President Donald Trump a friend and says they have a lot of “mutual respect” for each other, but believes he’s the one who can actually deliver national unity, Ramaswamy told the Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview.

Ramaswamy, who announced his run for president Tuesday, thinks the former president is “misunderstood” and that he cares about unifying the country, he told the DCNF. Trump cares a lot about bringing the country together, he said, but Ramaswamy thinks he will be the one who can make it happen.

“Do we care more about pummeling the other person into the ground, or do we care about having a nation, one nation under God left at the end of it?” said Ramaswamy. “I think we both care about national unity, the question is which of us can actually deliver it.”

Ramaswamy said he will handle Trump “with honesty” in the primaries, and noted he even finds his political story inspiring.

“I don’t think I would’ve thought of doing this if he hadn’t done what he did in 2015 and 2016, as a true outsider. … I respect him, I even take some inspiration from it,” said Ramaswamy.

Ramaswamy plans to focus on the substance of his agenda in 2023, and providing the American people with “actual solutions,” rather than focus on his opponents. He said he’s already suggesting “tangible” policies that resonate with Republican voters, instead of just vocalizing against “woke ideology and the radical left.”

“I believe I am, and will continue to be, the leader in defining key specific policy solutions that we can deliver to the American people, and revive American national identity, and then in 2024 it’ll be up to the voters to decide,” Ramaswamy told the DCNF.

He promised to end affirmative action and the obsession with climate change, solve the fentanyl crisis by securing the border, increase independence from China, reinstate free speech and political expression as civil rights and emphasize merit in society. He plans to shut down government agencies, and said the Department of Education will be the first.

Ramaswamy believes these issues connect with Americans and that every Republican agrees, but no candidate or politician is “advancing” them. He’s concerned with vocalizing his solutions this year, rather than focusing on his opponents.

“Reviving a missing American national identity,” he said, is the focal point of his agenda. “I think people are actually hungry for that, I think people are a little sick of obsessing over the question of the who.”

Ramaswamy is a businessman and entrepreneur who went to Harvard University for undergrad before attending Yale Law School. He founded Roivant Sciences, a biotech company, and Strive, an asset management group.

Strive is a competitor of other big asset firms who use capital to further climate change agendas and social movement initiatives. Ramaswamy intends for Republican states to do business with his anti-ESG, environmental, social and governance, firm rather than affiliate with companies that they don’t agree with, according to Axios.

He is also the author of “Woke Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam” and “Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, the Death of Merit, and the Path Back to Excellence.”

Ramaswamy is the third Republican candidate to enter the race, and only the second to declare against the former president alongside former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley.

The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.