"Would go for “total de-coupling” with China if I come to power, says Indian-American Vivek Ramaswamy

Vivek Ramaswamy, the Indian-American lawmaker who is set to contest against former President Donald Trump in the 2024 elections, has called China the “biggest threat” that the US faces and has said that he would go for “total de-coupling” with Beijing if he comes to power.

Vivek Ramaswamy, the Indian-American lawmaker who is set to contest against former President Donald Trump in the 2024 elections, 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. He 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.

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. He added, “I think if we are willing to enter the trade relationships with Japan, South Korea, Philippines, even India, Thailand, Vietnam, Brazil, that makes it much more tractable, than we make it out to be. I think that’s achievable.

Speaking on the Chinese spy balloon — that flew over the US territory and was shot down by the American military in February this year — he said that the US would have been immediately shot down if it had been from Russia. “If that would have been a Russian spy balloon, flying over the country, we would have shot it down immediately and put up sanctions. The reason we did not do it with Chinese spy balloons, is that we are afraid of our economic dependence on China. So, I have a clear plan. I would re-enter our trade relationship, elsewhere in the Pacific, and that would put me in a position to lead our declaration of independence from China,” he said.

Ramaswamy also sounded an alarm over the growing Russia-China ties calling it the “single-largest military threat” and said that the US needs to deter this alliance. “The number one threat, that we need to pay attention to is the growing ties between Russia and China. I need we need to drive a wedge between the alliance. I think this is the single-largest military threat that we face. And that is what gives Jinping the confidence to risk a war with the US over Taiwan on the bet that the US would not like to go after two different nuclear powers (Russia and China) at the same time,” he said.

Vivek Ramaswamy is a native of southwest Ohio. His mother was a geriatric psychiatrist and his father worked as an engineer at General Electric. 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. (ANI)

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)