COUNCIL BLUFFS, Iowa (AP) — Ten minutes before Vivek Ramaswamy was to take the stage at a dated casino hotel in western Iowa, no one was in the conference room except two staffers from the Iowa GOP, which organized the event, and a group journalists.
Just as the event was scheduled, guests started trickling in. By the time Ramaswamy began his remarks an hour later, about sixty people were there.
While Ramaswamy has packed his schedule with stops across Iowa, including multiple events on Tuesday and Wednesday, he has failed to advance in the 2024 Republican primaries and is increasingly at risk of becoming an afterthought. He’s polling in the mid to high single digits and critics are wondering what his end game is and whether he’s staying in the race solely to boost former President Donald Trump.
Ramaswamy is falling behind just as the Republican campaign enters the critical final weeks before the January 15 Iowa caucuses. After an earlier wave of attention, the 38-year-old biotech entrepreneur and first-time political candidate is becoming known more for his debate provocations than for signs that his campaign is resonating with voters.
“If viability was the reason for staying in a race, he’s long since left that behind,” said David Kochel, a Republican strategist who advised Jeb Bush in his 2016 presidential bid. “If you like Vivek Ramaswamy and what he says in this campaign, then you already have a candidate, and his name is Donald Trump.”
Former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis are increasingly going after each other as they battle for a distant second place, competing for donors and voters open to a Trump alternative. Former Vice President Mike Pence and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott quit after running Iowa-targeted campaigns that failed to achieve success.
Ramaswamy’s campaign said in early November that it would spend up to $8 million on advertising through the Jan. 15 Iowa caucuses. So far, the campaign has generated just $162,000 in broadcast and digital ads for the remainder of the campaign in Iowa, according to data from media tracking company AdImpact.
Haley and her allied super PAC have booked nearly $3.5 million during that same period, while DeSantis and his allied super PAC have booked more than $3.3 million.
Tricia McLaughlin, spokeswoman for Ramaswamy’s campaign, said events hosted by the campaign have been drawing more people lately, noting that a significant number of event attendees are not registered as Republicans.
“We reach young people,” she says. “These people take the time and effort to come out. These people are not even being interviewed because they are not the typical caucus goer.”
Ramaswamy has floated policy ideas that he says continue Trump’s “America First” legacy without the former president’s baggage.
At a GOP event in Florida earlier this month, Ramaswamy probably drew the biggest cheers when he said he was the Republican candidate who most supported Trump.
“I respect Donald Trump more than anyone else in this race because he was the best president of the 21st century,” Ramaswamy said. “I’ve said that before and I’ll say it again because it’s the right thing to do. We will honor that legacy.”
Trump remains dominant even as he faces four criminal charges and questions about whether he can defeat President Joe Biden after losing to him in 2020.
After the October 7 surprise attack on Israel, Ramaswamy has drawn criticism for not being as staunchly pro-Israel as the other Republican candidates. Two days after the Hamas attack, he proposed that the US suspend aid to Israel until the government worked out plans for Gaza. Republican voters strongly align with Israel.
Voters and strategists critical of Ramaswamy bring up his position on Israel, but also his age and faith.
Ramaswamy is Hindu and would be the first non-Christian elected president. Republican voters in Iowa are overwhelmingly white and Christian, while evangelicals wield enormous influence in the caucuses.
The meeting at the Council Bluffs hotel began with an opening prayer that ended with “in the name of our savior Jesus Christ.” The crowd responded with a collective “amen.”
Although he was cheered and applauded for some of his comments, he was met with silence when he opened up about his religion.
“I would be the first Hindu president we had in the United States,” he said. ‘I will tell you about my faith. I believe in one true God. I believe that God placed each of us here for a purpose, that we have a moral obligation to live out that purpose.”
Ramaswamy did not answer questions from the audience or reporters. Many people in the audience refused to speak to an Associated Press reporter afterward.
Rebecca Wilkerson, a 52-year-old voter from Mondamin, Iowa, said most of her friends and family still support Trump as she did for the past seven years, but she is now looking for change and says Trump is too old there is for. the White House at the age of 77. She became a follower of Ramaswamy despite the people around her being concerned about his religion.
“They can’t ignore the fact that he’s Hindu,” Wilkerson said. “But I don’t vote on that basis. I like his policies, and that’s what I care about in a president.”
The next day, Ramaswamy attended a roundtable discussion with Haley and DeSantis hosted by Bob Vander Plaats, an influential Christian activist from Iowa. In what was billed as a “family meeting,” the three candidates addressed each other by their first names and avoided following each other. Vander Ruimte asked each of them questions about faith.
“I think it’s only fair to address what I feel is your biggest hurdle, based on what I’m hearing,” Vander Plaats told Ramaswamy. “We do not share the same faith. I am a christian. You are a Hindu and you focused your campaign on the truth. So a question many caucusgoers have is: What truth is there?
Ramaswamy said he was grateful for the question. Holding his three-year-old son, Karthik, on his lap, Ramaswamy repeated what he told the room in Council Bluffs, that he believed in one true God and that God “put each of us here for a purpose.”
“My faith teaches me that we have a duty, a moral duty, to fulfill that purpose, that we are God’s instruments,” he said. “He works through us in different ways, but we are still equal because God lives in each of us.”
Ron Bonjean, a Republican strategist and former top congressional aide, noted that Ramaswamy has tried to build on the momentum built in the first debate, when he seized the spotlight and portrayed himself as a thin man with a hard-to-pronounce name. He then stated that he was the only person on stage who was not bought and paid for.
‘He’s aggressive. He is trying to do the right things to get noticed, to show voters that he is an alternative to Trump,” Bonjean said, adding that his efforts should be seen as a “Trump mini-me.”
“He is excellent at debating other candidates on stage, but he cannot back this up with real-world leadership and government experience,” he added.
Lisa Unnerstall, 63, a Republican voter from Fort Myers, Florida, said she likes Ramaswamy and would like to see him in Trump’s Cabinet because of his “progressive thinking.” But she said her first and second choices are Trump and DeSantis.
“I’m concerned about his age,” Unnerstall said of Ramaswamy. “I don’t think someone necessarily has to have been a politician for years to become president. Of course I voted for Trump. He was not a politician. So I really think it’s more about life experience.”
___
Gomez Licon reported from Miami. Associated Press writer Chad Day in Washington contributed to this report.