DES MOINES, Iowa — In a campaign conversation Sunday with veterans in Des Moines, biotech entrepreneur and GOP presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy called for a rejection of the idea of a “national divorce” in favor of the beginning of a national revival.
Ramaswamy, who describes himself as an unapologetic America First candidate, told a packed VFW Post 9127 hall in the city’s Beaverdale neighborhood Sunday morning that his is more than a presidential campaign — it’s a mission to reclaim the soul of America.
“There are two ways to run: You run from something or you run to something. What I’m hopefully giving us is a chance to run toward something,” said the author and anti-woke crusader, who launched his bid for the White House in February on a quest to help solve what he says is America’s “identity crisis.”
JFK had his “New Frontier.” FDR led the “New Deal.” Ramaswamy is preaching a “New Dream.”
“It’s about reviving our conviction in our purpose as citizens,” he said. “What are we running toward? To me, it’s the individual, the family, the nation, and God. Those are actual real truths [not wokeisms]… Let’s run toward what actually undergirded our culture in the first place.”
It was the kind of message that resonates — particularly on a crisp, bright, spring Sunday morning in the heart of the heartland. It was the kind of message Ramaswamy and his GOP competitors spent a lot of time communicating over the weekend in Iowa, the state that leads the nation in the presidential nomination process.
Ramaswamy joined former President Donald Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence, U.S. Senator Tim Scott, (R-South Carolina), among others, at Saturday evening’s 23rd annual Spring Kick-Off hosted by the Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition.
About 1,000 people turned out to the event, an opportunity for GOP presidential candidates to make their case to evangelical Christians — one of the more powerful voting bases in Iowa politics. In the post-Roe v. Wade era, the candidates preached their commitment to the sanctity of life.
“I will stand proudly in defense of innocent life, just as I did for four very powerful, strong years,” Trump told the assemblage. “Because every child born and unborn is a sacred gift from God.”
Trump is the early frontrunner — by far — in the increasingly crowded field of declared and presumptive GOP candidates. The former president has had the blessing of Iowa evangelical Christians, winning 76 percent of the white evangelical vote in 2020, and 80 percent in 2016, according to Edison Research Exit Polls.
While Pence is distantly trailing Trump and the nearest competitor, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, in most polls, the former vice president has long been warmly embraced by evangelicals.
He joined the chorus of conservative candidates pushing back on the left’s identity politics agenda.
“The battle against radical gender ideology is a battle for religious freedom,” Pence told the crowd “And it’s a battle that we must fight.”
DeSantis had a conflicting commitment, as did former South Carolina Governor and Trump ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley.
But conservative talk show host Larry Elder, the most recent entry into the race for the GOP presidential nomination was there, as were former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson and Michigan businessman Perry Johnson. Former U.S. Representatives Will Hurd and outspoken Democratic Party critic Tulsi Gabbard, who left the Democrats in October, also spoke at the Faith and Freedom cattle call.
The event was one of several stops Ramaswamy made during a four-day campaign bus tour through eastern and central Iowa.
The Ohio businessman had plenty of time to talk to and take questions from veterans at Sunday’s VFW event. It’s the conversation, the exercise of the Land of the Free’s foundational right, that Ramaswamy says he loves.
“I’m going to tell you what I think, and then you can come back and tell me what you think because that’s America,” the political outsider said to a roar of applause.
At 37, Ramaswamy is the youngest candidate in the GOP presidential race, and he’s proud of being the first millennial Republican to run for president. He was a junior in high school on September 11, 2001. Ramaswamy said he gave a speech to his high school’s 2020 graduating class, filled with young men and women born after the generation-defining terrorist attacks.
Much has changed over those two decades, he said, with the dangerous rise of a culture of victimhood.
That’s why the “revival” of American exceptionalism and the founding values is so critical, Ramaswamy said.
“If we can revive that, nothing in the world, not a country, not a corporation, not a virus is going to defeat us,” he told the veterans. “That’s what American exceptionalism is all about, and that is what we together are going to revive to save this great nation.”
– – –
M.D. Kittle is the National Political Editor for The Star News Network.
Photo “Faith and Freedom Coalition Event” by Asa Hutchinson.
What worries me is the Christian declaration “Gods got that”. As if to say; I’m not concerned about what is happening now, I’m a good Christian and I’m going to heaven. I believe this is one of the beliefs of conservatism that has led us to where we are now. You cannot just sit back and let America and our Constitutional freedoms go down the toilet out of your lack of concern for the here and now.