DES MOINES, Iowa — Businessman Vivek Ramaswamy announced Monday that he is dropping out of the 2024 presidential race after a poor showing in the Iowa caucuses and endorsed former President Donald Trump.
Ramaswamy finished fourth in Iowa, far behind Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley. Ramaswamy had 8 percent of the caucus vote with more than 90% of precincts reporting.
“As of this moment we are going to suspend this presidential campaign”, Ramaswamy said. “There’s no path for me to be the next president absent things that we don’t want to see happen in this country.”
“There needs to be an America First candidate in this race,” Ramaswamy added. “Going forward, he will have my full endorsement for the presidency.”
The 38-year-old was not well known when he entered the race but quickly aligned with Trump to appeal to the former president’s base as the next generation of the MAGA movement.
However, on Saturday, Trump took aim at the tech businessman after Ramaswamy called him “wounded” in an interview.
“Vivek started his campaign as a great supporter, ‘the best President in generations,’ etc. Unfortunately now all he does is disguise his support in the form of deceitful campaign tricks,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Ramaswamy used millions of dollars of his own money into the campaign and held the most public events out of all the other candidates, including over 300 in Iowa.
