New Delhi: Vivek Ramaswamy, an Indian-American multimillionaire entrepreneur and author, said on Tuesday that he is entering the 2024 Republican presidential nomination race.
"I am proud to say tonight that I am running for president to revive those ideals in this country," Vivek Ramaswamy said during a live interview on Fox News’s prime time show of Tucker Carlson, adding, “I think we need to put ‘merit’ back into ‘America’ in every spirit of our lives.”
"This isn’t just a political campaign; this is a cultural movement to create a new dream for the next generation of Americans," Vivek Ramaswamy asserted saying that his campaign is "about the unapologetic pursuit of excellence in our country. It means you believe in merit; that you get ahead in this country not on the color of your skin but on the content of your character and your contributions."
“We’re in the middle of a national identity crisis,” he said, adding "If you ask people in my generation, really any generation, what does it mean to be an American today, you get a blank stare in response.”
In an announcement video, Ramaswamy said the “woke left preys on that vacuum” and tells Americans that their race, gender and sexual orientation “govern who you are, what you can achieve and what you are allowed to think.”
Who is Vivek Ramaswamy?
Ramaswamy, 37, is a former biotechnology executive and the best-selling author of "Woke, Inc.: Inside Corporate America’s Social Justice Scam," which was published in August 2021. He has been dubbed "the CEO of Anti-Woke, Inc." in a New Yorker magazine profile last year.
He also authored "Nation of Victims: Identity Politics, the Death of Merit, and the Path Back to Excellence," which was published last year in September.
Ramaswamy is an environmental, social, and governance (ESG) cynic -- a framework under which financial companies consider the long-term societal effects of their investment decisions.
In 2014, Ramaswamy founded Roivant Sciences, a biotech holding company with an innovative financial strategy to develop drugs, often by purchasing drugs that have been forgotten or abandoned by the pharmaceutical industry.
He also 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.
In 2016, he was ranked 24th on the 'America's Richest Entrepreneurs Under 40 2016' list with a net worth of 600 million dollars.
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.
Early life and education
The 37-year-old entrepreneur was raised in Cincinnati, Ohio. According to the New Yorker, his father worked as an engineer and a patent attorney at General Electric. His mother was a geriatric psychiatrist.
Speaking about his early life, Ramaswamy whose parents immigrated from Kerala to the United States said, "I grew up in Ohio in the 90’s as a skinny kid with nerdy glasses and a funny last name. My parents taught me that if you’re going to stand out, then you might as well be outstanding. Achievement was my ticket to get ahead. I went on to found multi-billion-dollar companies. And I did it while getting married – raising a family and following my faith in God."
He graduated from St. Xavier High School in Cincinnati in 2003.
Ramaswamy then enrolled in Harvard for a bachelor's degree in biology. He went on to pursue law from Yale Law School. He got into the business of creating medicines and was also investing in biotech, according to Lifestyle Asia.