Vivek Ramaswamy’s so-called America First campaign of attacking Nikki Haley proves he will put America last.
Let’s start with the obvious. Ramaswamy went into the first debate with a gust of momentum. It has been downhill since then. With every debate, his poll numbers dropped as millions of Americans got to know the real Vivek. For all his talk of “TRUTH,” this is a man who has flip-flopped more times than John Kerry circa 2004.
Pick an issue—Trump, Israel, climate change, trade—and he has been on both sides of the issue. He was against Trump before he was for him. He said climate change was real before he called it a hoax. He rants and raves about the “consultant class” and “super PAC puppets.” Alas, his supporters might be appalled to know that Ramaswamy pays a horde of consultants and boasts a million-dollar super PAC of his own.
In other words, the candidate who claims to traffic in the TRUTH is a world-class swindler, and his supporters have officially been swindled.
More importantly, Ramaswamy lacks the number one quality one needs in a president: Leadership. Before I tell you what leadership is, I will tell you what it is not.
Leadership is not viral social media posts. Leadership is not hurling insults and scoring cheap political points. Leadership is not labeling blatant lies about your opponents as “TRUTH.”
So, what is leadership? Ambassador Nikki Haley said it best. Leadership is about bringing out the best in people, even those who disagree with you. It’s about sticking to principle. It’s about bringing people in instead of pushing people away.
That’s what we get from Nikki Haley. At a time of unprecedented American weakness, Nikki refuses to apologize for American strength. She understands that America needs allies and that dictators will prey on weakness.
That’s why she supports sending military aid—not troops to Ukraine as it faces off against a tyrannical Vladimir Putin. That’s why she has Israel’s back in its existential war against Hamas. That’s why she refuses to play nice with China.
We don’t have to guess what Ramaswamy’s version of American retreat will look like. Just look at what has happened under three years of Biden cozying up to dictators and appeasing murderers. The world is on fire, and along comes Vivek Ramaswamy, who says we should sit on the sidelines and watch it burn.
Being president of the United States isn’t a game. We are talking about people’s lives and livelihoods. For all his dismissiveness of “experience” in favor of his 38-year-old wisdom, I’m certain Ramaswamy would prefer to seek out an experienced doctor over a “wise” doctor who learned how to operate from YouTube.
To soldiers like the brave Americans I served with, experience is prized. We don’t treat the first-year private the same as a three-decade general. We don’t want to trust our lives to a newbie who changes his position on issues like the seasons.
The soldiers I know want someone like Nikki Haley at the helm—someone who has gone toe-to-toe with dictators previously and didn’t flinch. Someone with the moral clarity to know the difference between good and evil. They want a leader that will fight to protect all Americans by projecting strength.
As the wife of a combat veteran who is currently deployed, the last thing Haley wants is to engage in unnecessary wars. But she knows that weakness in the face of our enemies isn’t “America First.” It’s America Dead Last.
I’ve seen firsthand the message that a strong America sends to our enemies. During my 10 tours in Afghanistan, I saw how our enemies feared us. I’ve seen how our allies respected us. And I’ve seen our soldiers feel pride in the country they served.
Nikki Haley will fight to restore that America. Vivek Ramaswamy will just fight for the sake of fighting.
