Vivek Ramaswamy slams Ann Coulter’s racist rant
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Indian American Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign slammed conservative commentator Ann Coulter after she described Ramaswamy’s back-and-forth with fellow Indian American hopeful Nikki Haley at the party’s first debate as “Hindu business.”
“Ann can tweet whatever she wants to,” Tricia McLaughlin, Ramaswamy’s communications director, said in a statement to The Hill. “Vivek has traveled this country and is very grateful for the warm support he has received from Christian voters across the country.”
“Vivek shares and lives by the same Judeo-Christian values that this nation was founded on — and that the way Vivek lives his family life offers a positive example for their own children and grandchildren,” she added.
READ : Nikki Haley, Vivek Ramaswamy clash over Israel before debate (August 22, 2023)
Coulter’s post on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, came amid a fiery exchange between Ramaswamy and Haley at the first Republican presidential primary debate on Wednesday.
After Ramaswamy said he did not support providing additional US aid to Ukraine amid its war with Russia, Haley slammed the political newcomer’s lack of foreign policy experience.
“He wants to hand Ukraine to Russia, he wants to let China eat Taiwan, he wants to go and stop funding Israel,” Haley said. “You don’t do that to friends. What you do instead is you have the backs of your friends.”
“Under your watch, you will make America less safe,” she added. “You have no foreign policy experience, and it shows.”
Coulter, who was posting on X throughout the debate, said in a post during the exchange, “Nikki and Vivek are involved in some Hindu business, it seems. Not our fight.”
While Ramaswamy is Hindu, Haley is not. The former South Carolina governor was raised Sikh and converted to Christianity.
Coulter previously came under fire in February for making derogatory remarks about Haley’s Indian heritage.
Shortly after Haley announced her candidacy, the conservative commentator suggested that she “go back to [her] own country.” The Republican hopeful was born in the US to Indian immigrant parents.
READ: Ann Coulter tells Nikki Haley to ‘go back to your own country’ (February 17, 2023)
Appearing on the “The Mark Simone Show” podcast, Coulter made several xenophobic comments about the former South Carolina governor, the first ever Indian American to serve in a presidential cabinet as US ambassador to the United Nations.
“Why don’t you go back to your own country?” she said while attacking India as well.
“Her candidacy did remind me that I need to immigrate to India so I can demand they start taking down parts of their history,” she said. “What’s with the worshipping of the cows? They’re all starving over there. Did you know they have a rat temple, where they worship rats?”
READ MORE: Vivek Ramaswamy advocates national holiday for single-day voting (August 9, 2023)
As the American Bazaar reported in February, the commentator also called the presidential aspirant a “bimbo,” “an absolutely ridiculous character,” and a “preposterous creature.” Coulter was especially critical of Haley for ordering the removal of the Confederate flag from the grounds of the South Carolina Statehouse following the 2015 shooting at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston.
She said, “This is my country, lady. I’m not an American Indian, and I don’t like them taking down all the monuments.”
Coulter, who has a long history of racist remarks, told Fox at the time: “I’m a student of American history. I would really like to like Nikki Haley since she is a Republican. On the other hand, she is an immigrant and does not understand America’s history.”
When the Fox anchor asked if she thinks “immigrants can’t understand the history,” Coulter said: “Well, [Haley] doesn’t. The Confederate flag we’re talking about never flew over an official Confederate building. It was a battle flag. It is to honor Robert E. Lee. And anyone who knows the first thing about military history, knows that there is no greater army that ever took the field than the Confederate Army.”
Haley was born in South Carolina in 1972. Her parents immigrated to the United States from Punjab via Canada.
