Part Two: Will the Real Vivek Please Stand Up?
From J6, pardons, Soros, China, and more, no candidate since Mitt Romney in 2012 has flip-flopped on more issues than Vivek Ramaswamy.
It’s a wonderful thing when someone reevaluates their beliefs and course-corrects their positions but an absence of explanation for the sudden pivot calls into question the sincerity of the shift.
I asked in the prequel piece: “Ramaswamy’s defenders are quick to accuse anyone questioning his issue acrobatics here as “attacking” — but isn’t questioning candidates, particularly those who come from out of nowhere with no political background — part of the election process?” It’s difficult to convince voters of your sincerity when you hold opposing positions on the same issue.
The first Republican primary debate is tomorrow and Vivek Ramaswamy has found it difficult to nail down whether it’s a good or bad thing that Trump isn’t participating:
“It would be fundamental uncourageous for Donald Trump to refuse to debate and I’m not going to let him get away with that very easily.”
“I don’t have a strong opinion on it.”
Trump is rumored to have cut a deal with him for Ramaswamy to be his stalking horse in the primary. A listener posited: What if it’s pharma?
He said he didn’t vote before 2020
Ramaswamy actually cast his first vote for a Libertarian in 2004:
Ramaswamy notably asserted in two interviews released on June 30 and July 12 that he did not vote until 2020, when he backed former President Donald Trumpover now-President Joe Biden. However, the wealthy entrepreneur actually first voted in the 2004 presidential election for the late Libertarian nominee Michael Badnarik, according to Ramaswamy as well as Ohio database records in Butler and Franklin counties.
As far as his recent political leanings, he’s donated thousands to ActBlue and the DNC for years, including very recently.
J6
Before he entered the primary Ramaswamy absolutely blasted Trump over January 6th, blaming him for inciting a riot. He pulled another 180 after he entered the primary stating that Trump wasn’t the cause.
But days after the riot Ramaswamy strongly condemned the former president:
He mostly scrubbed Twitter but couldn’t scrub his book, “Nation of Victims:”
Pardoning the Bidens
Ramaswamy said in an interview with the New York Post and literally ON CAMERA in another interview that he’d consider pardoning the Biden family:
“After the I am leading the great revival. After we have shut down the FBI, after we have refurbished the Department of Justice, after we have systemically pardoned anyone who was a victim of a political motivated persecution — from Donald Trump and peaceful January 6 protests — then would I would be open to evaluating pardons for members of the Biden family in the interest of moving the nation forward.”
… before changing his mind and accusing everyone who criticized him for it of lying about what he'd said — resulting in Twitter/X slapping him with the dreaded “community note” correction:
MRNA
A pharmaceutical firm that is part of Roivant Sciences, of which Ramaswamy is still a stakeholder, is suing over their mRNA tech:
Genevant Sciences, a portfolio company of Roivant Sciences, is suing Moderna and Pfizer over patented COVID vaccine technology while also being sued by another biotech company linked with Pfizer’s vaccine.
Ramaswamy founded Roivant Sciences, and was CEO of the biotech research company from 2014 until 2021. He continued as its board chairman until February of this year before he stepped down.
Mediaite reported how days before launching his presidential bid Ramaswamy paid a guy to scrub any mention of MRNA tech or his association with anything that helped to create the COVID shot.
The Soros Fellow
Despite raging against the Deep State and its funders, Ramaswamy is an actual Soros Fellow who’s praised Soros:
The guy Ramaswamy paid to scrub his Wikipedia page of any association with mRNA also scrubbed any mention of his Soros Fellowship.
Ramaswamy seems to have paid Wikipedia editor “Jhofferman,” to remove information from his page that he presumably thought would damage his candidacy in the Republican primary. A few days later, he announced his 2024 bid.
The editor scrubbed off information related to Ramaswamy’s recipience of the Paul & Daisy Soros Fellowship for New Americans in 2011, during his time as a Yale law student. Paul Soros is the older brother of billionaire democratic donor George Soros, who has been the subject of perennial antisemitic conspiracy theories peddled by the right. (The fellowship Ramaswamy received is dedicated to help immigrants and children of immigrants pursuing graduate school.)
He said that he accepted the Soros award so he could afford law school — except he was already a millionaire.
China, Taiwan, and Israel
Despite claiming that he’d move US manufacturing and supply chains from China, Ramaswamy’s Roivant has several Chinese subsidiary companies. Also:
However, Ramaswamy was a featured speaker at a Shanghai investment conference in 2018. Moreover, he has launched companies out of China and formed partnerships with Chinese firms. In one such deal, Ramaswamy’s Roivant partnered with the CIVIC Group, a state-owned investment company of the Chinese government, to launch an outfit called Sinovant Sciences.
Ramaswamy also said last week that he’d give Taiwan to China. His reasoning is crude in its simplicity and demonstrates a limited understanding of tensions in the region:
"And the truth of the matter is, there are two reasons why China wants to annex Taiwan. One is to squat on the semiconductor supply chain, so they can exert leverage over the United States of America. That's not happening on my watch. I take a firm position on that. But the second reason why is that they have unfinished nationalistic business dating back to their civil war in 1949. And if that's the sole basis for Xi Jinping going after Taiwan, after we have semiconductor independence, then you know what, I am not going to send our sons and daughters to die over that conflict.”
So as long as the tech bros get their chips then it’s OK for jackbooted commie thugs to invade where they please?
A few things. First: It’s idiotic to compare Ukraine to Taiwan. The U.S. has no interests in Ukraine. It’s a land dispute between a dying power and an area what was formerly under its control.
Second: We aren’t reliant upon superconductor manufacturing or access through the South China Sea in Ukraine like we are with Taiwan. While we stupidly rely on some dirty Russian oil and gas (the EU as is) Russia isn’t in any position to lay claim to the majority of oil and gas resources in the same way China holds a monopoly on rare earth elements that fuel the entirety of the “green” agenda.
Third: This isn’t just about superconductors, it’s about maritime status quo through one of, if not the, most important trade routes in the world. China has made it clear that its ambition isn’t just claiming Taiwan but controlling the South China Sea.
“Let’s just call a spade a spade: I didn’t know much of this six months ago,” he appeared to say of foreign policy in general.
Fourth: U.S. influence is in part measured by its alliances. I’ve been an anti-neo con and anti-nation builder for the entirety of my life but even I recognize the difference between foreign welfare and protecting alliances that we use as a first layer against foreign aggression. Emboldening China and weakening allies has consequences. New Zealand, a Five Eyes member, couldn't bring itself to condemn China’s treatment of Uyghurs due to its 30% export dependence on China.
How can Ramaswamy be tough on China while giving China a green light to invade? How does this inspire faith in the U.S. by our allies? How do you achieve peace by appeasing enemies? Is this Ramaswamy talking or his Chinese investments? I and others have said that the Biden family business dealings with China has compromised them and national security. Wouldn’t it be the similarly so with Ramaswamy?
Ramaswamy also called for ending aid to Israel, our sole ally in the Middle East, but he hasn’t been consistent:
The candidate’s stance on the military aid—$3 billion a year, which Israel is largely required to spend on U.S.-manufactured equipment—has changed several times over the past few months. This week, he told the Washington Free Beacon that he supports ending the military funding once the current package passed by Congress expires in 2028, arguing that the aid will be unnecessary after he successfully negotiates new peace treaties between Israel and its Arab neighbors during the first year of his presidency …
Ramaswamy's latest stance on Israeli military funding comes two months after the candidate told the Free Beacon that he supported continuing aid to Israel. The Free Beacon asked Ramaswamy to clarify his position in June after he was videotaped telling a small campaign gathering that he would consider ending military financial support to the Jewish state.
His defenders don’t offer much of a defense, arguing that he’s not well-versed in these issues and offering the tired cliche of “because he’s not a politician” (you most certainly can be a businessman and a de facto politician, in fact, it’s required). Hi! We’re facing a monumental geopolitical threat in the pacific with a commie thugocracy that has partnered with the old dying Soviet thugocracy, bio and tech warfare, and you’re telling us that it’s OK if your candidate has admittedly no concept of one of the largest, main pillars of the job? For parents with draft-age kids, a learning-on-the-job Commander-in-Chief doesn’t sound so assuring in times like these.
On 9/11
During an interview with The Atlantic Ramaswamy drew a clumsy comparison from 9/11 to J6:
“I think it is legitimate to say how many police, how many federal agents, were on the planes that hit the Twin Towers. Maybe the answer is zero. It probably is zero for all I know, right? I have no reason to think it was anything other than zero. But if we’re doing a comprehensive assessment of what happened on 9/11, we have a 9/11 commission, absolutely that should be an answer the public knows the answer to. Well, if we’re doing a January 6 commission, absolutely, those should be questions that we should get to the bottom of,” he said. “‘Here are the people who were armed. Here are the people who are unarmed.’ What percentage of the people who were armed were federal law-enforcement officers? I think it was probably high, actually. Right?”
Ramaswamy later said he never said the thing he was recorded as saying on audio.
He previously told The Blaze that he wants the truth on 9/11.
***
Which Vivek Ramaswamy will show up to tomorrow’s debate? Is Ramaswamy just an ambitious Big Pharma bro, a stalking horse, both, who?
He’s a plant.
Flim-Flam man.