Musk calls Indian-American Ramaswamy as “promising candidate” for US presidental polls

WASHINGTON: Elon Musk on Thursday praised Indian-American lawmaker Vivek Ramaswamy — who is set to contest against Donald Trump in Republican primaries for presidential polls — calling him a “very promising candidate”. “He is a very promising candidate,” Elon Musk said on X (formerly Twitter) while referring to Ramaswamy’s interview with popular journalist Tucker Carlson.

Meanwhile, Ramswamy has been quite straightforward with his agenda for the poll campaign. He has called China the “biggest threat” that the US faces and said that he would go for “total de-coupling” with Beijing if he comes to power. The Republican leader has also said that he would aim to completely re-enter the trade in the Pacific and enter trade relationships with countries like India, Japan, and South Korea. Earlier, in an interview with Fox News, Ramaswamy said, “Xi Jinping is the dictator and China is the top threat that the United States faces. I think I am the clearest candidate in declaring a clear path in declaring economic independence from China. That would be the first step in our policy”.

He further said that he would go for a “total de-coupling” with China and ban most of the US companies from doing business in Beijing. “I would go for total de-coupling. I would ban most US companies from doing business with China, unless and until the CCP reforms its behaviour…I think there would be short-term consequences, but I think we can make sacrifices if we know what we are sacrificing for. I also think that when you are most willing to make a sacrifice, you actually do not have to make one at all,” Ramaswamy said.

The 37-year-old lawmaker was born on August 9, 1985, and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio. His parents migrated to the US from Kerala. He is the third Indian-American — along with Nikki Haley and Hirsh Vardhan Singh — who will be up against former President Donald Trump in the primaries in January next year.

He attended Harvard University for his undergrad and later got a law degree from Yale University. Ramaswamy is the author of "Woke, Inc: Inside Corporate America's Social Justice Scam" and has been dubbed "the CEO of Anti-Woke Inc" by The New Yorker. A second-generation Indian American, Ramaswamy founded Roivant Sciences in 2014 and led the largest biotech IPOs of 2015 and 2016, eventually culminating in successful clinical trials in multiple disease areas that led to FDA-approved products, according to his bio.

He has founded other successful healthcare and technology companies, and in 2022, he launched Strive Asset Management, a new firm focused on restoring the voices of everyday citizens in the American economy by leading companies to focus on excellence over politics. Ramaswamy is married to Apoorva Tewari Ramaswamy, an Assistant Professor at the Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.