CNN town hall with Vivek Ramaswamy in Iowa

GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy said he would put the Federal Reserve "back in its place" and stabilize the US dollar to address the wage gap issue in the country.

He then went on to say that he would implement a single mandate for the Federal Reserve: "Dollar stability. Peg the dollar to commodities. That ties the hands of our government. That's a good thing," he said.

More context: The Federal Reserve said Wednesday it is holding its interest rate steady and could cut rates at least three times next year. Wall Street celebrated the end of almost two years of aggressive rate hikes.

Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy said he would send undocumented migrants back to their countries of origin if elected president.

"Not because they're all bad people. In fact, many of them are good people. Many of them, if we are being honest, if we were in their shoes, and there's a president of the United States who've been giving them a wink and nod to come on over, if we were in a tough spot, maybe we would've done the same thing. This is not a value judgment about those people. It's a value judgment about this country," he added. "We are founded on a rule of law," he said.

Ramaswamy said later on in the town hall he would end birthright citizenship for the children of undocumented immigrants as president but conceded that he would not revoke the citizenship of American-born children whose parents immigrated illegally.

Ramaswamy told CNN’s Abby Phillip he plans to end “the illegal incentives” for people to enter the US illegally, arguing the clause in the 14th Amendment that grants citizenship to all persons “born or naturalized in the United States” should not apply to the children of undocumented immigrants.

“I want to implement, I would say the best border policies of all, which is ending the illegal incentives to be here. End birthright citizenship for the kids of illegal migrants to whom the 14th Amendment does not apply,” Ramaswamy said.

When pressed by Phillip if his proposal to end birthright citizenship would apply retroactively to Americans whose parents immigrated illegally and were born in the United States, Ramaswamy said the policy would apply “prospectively,” grandfathering in the American children of undocumented immigrants starting “January 20th, 2025 going forward.”

“There is a concept in the law known as a reliance interest. If you've relied on the government, we're not going to be able to retroactively date that. But from January 20 2025 going forward, if you're born in this country as the kid of an illegal immigrant, you will not enjoy birthright citizenship and that's what the 14th Amendment says,” Ramaswamy said.

Ramaswamy also said that he expected his proposals would be challenged in the courts, eventually ending up before the Supreme Court.

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy said his party has not done a good job reaching younger voters, as one of the youngest candidates in the race.

Samona Yentes, a self-employed Iowa who is an undecided Republican voter, asked Ramaswamy what makes him different from former President Donald Trump, other than his age.

“I think we are reaching a new generation of voters in this country," he said, touting his visits to colleges, but not directly answering Yentes' question.

Ramaswamy said the country needs an outsider to get things done.

“It's going to take a president who comes from the outside, a businessman," Ramaswamy said. “It’s also going to take a president who has a deep first personal understanding of the law and the constitution."

CNN moderator Abby Phillip pressed Ramaswamy on how he is specifically looking to differentiate himself from Trump. 

The tech entrepreneur said he is the only candidate in this field who has taken a "clear stand" in being against using eminent domain "to seize foreign land to build a carbon capture pipeline using federal subsidies."

More context: Generally, the government is allowed to acquire privately owned land for public use, otherwise known as eminent domain. Border barriers built under previous administrations have largely gone up in areas where land was federally owned, but extending the wall, as former President Donald Trump pledged to, required taking privately owned land. Under the Trump administration, officials moved at a faster rate to obtain land.

“Carbon capture” is often used as catch-all term for what are actually two sets of technologies – carbon capture and carbon removal. Carbon capture reduces the amount of carbon pollution that would otherwise go into the atmosphere by catching it at the source of pollution, then storing it or reusing it.

Vivek Ramaswamy is fielding questions in Iowa tonight during a CNN town hall — less than five weeks before the state’s January 15 caucuses kick off the 2024 Republican presidential nominating contest.

The 38-year-old tech entrepreneur launched his outsider campaign in February, which has focused on combatting “woke” ideology, exposing government corruption and ushering in a younger generation into the GOP. His campaign, however, has so far struggled to gain traction and break out in the thinning GOP primary.

Months ago, Ramaswamy was gaining traction in the polls. Now, the Ohio entrepreneur is still stuck in the single digits in a thinning GOP primary pack.

Former President Donald Trump — whom Ramaswamy has defended and praised repeatedly — remains the front-runner for the GOP nomination. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley are competing to be seen as the main Trump alternative in a field that has grown smaller with the recent exits of former Vice President Mike Pence and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott.

The town hall will stream live on CNN Max and for pay TV subscribers via CNN.com, CNN-connected TV and mobile apps. It will also be available on demand beginning Thursday to pay TV subscribers via CNN.com, CNN apps and Cable Operator Platforms.

Biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy is set to field questions from Iowa voters Wednesday at 9 p.m. ET at a CNN town hall, less than five weeks before the state’s January 15 caucuses kick off the 2024 Republican presidential nominating contest.

The town hall will stream live on CNN Max and for pay TV subscribers via CNN.com, CNN connected TV and mobile apps. It will also be available on demand beginning Thursday to pay TV subscribers via CNN.com, CNN apps and Cable Operator Platforms.

Here are five things to watch:

Differences with Haley: Among the most memorable exchanges at the four Republican presidential primary debates so far this year have been those between Ramaswamy and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley. On and off stage, their clashes have taken personal turns. Haley in recent weeks has risen in polls, challenging Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ status as the second-place contender in Iowa and emerging as the party’s top-polling alternative to Trump in GOP primary surveys in New Hampshire and South Carolina, her home state. Even if Ramaswamy doesn’t climb in the polls himself, his criticism has the potential to shape the GOP race.

No one to brawl with: To date, Ramaswamy might be best known to voters for his sharp-elbowed, stage-dominating debate performances. He has relished picking fights with rivals such as Haley, Christie, former Vice President Mike Pence and others. If he is going to jump out of the single digits in national and early-state polls of likely Republican primary voters, he’ll need to create memorable moments of his own, outside of the context of playing the foil in debates.

“Double Grassley”: Ramaswamy has focused on Iowa throughout his campaign. As part of that strategy, Ramaswamy announced his intention to have visited every Iowa county twice before the caucuses on January 15. Earlier this month, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis completed his goal of visiting all 99 Iowa counties – a feat dubbed the “Full Grassley” after Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley, who visits all counties in the state every year. Ramaswamy also pledged earlier this month to host more than 200 events in the state before the caucuses, a massive undertaking that speaks to how critical success in Iowa is to Ramaswamy’s potential path to the nomination.

Conspiracy theories: At the Alabama debate, Ramaswamy said the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol “looks like it was an inside job.” After the debate, he told CNN, “I do think we have a government that’s consistently lied to its people.” Over the weekend, he embraced another fringe theory, telling a crowd in Sioux Center, Iowa, that the plot to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was an inside job. Ramaswamy’s embrace of conspiracy theories could win him support from a share of the GOP base — many of the same pro-Trump voters who have parroted the former president’s lie that the 2020 election was stolen. But it could also alienate the broader general electorate. It’s likely to be a topic he addresses Wednesday night.

Questions of faith: Ramaswamy could also use Wednesday’s town hall to address his religion in a bid to assuage Iowa’s substantial evangelical Christian constituency that he, a Hindu, shares their values. He often cites his education at a Catholic high school in Cincinnati to substantiate his connection to Christian values. “When I read the Ten Commandments for the first time … it didn’t feel like I was reading those values for the first time,” he said last month in Ida Grove, Iowa. “And that’s when it hit me: Those values don’t belong to Hindus. Those values don’t belong to Christians. Those values belong to God, actually, and those are the values that this nation was absolutely founded on.”

Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy clashed throughout the fourth Republican primary debate in Tuscaloosa, Alabama earlier this month, reigniting one of the most contentious feuds of the primary cycle thus far, which was punctuated by Ramaswamy’s accusation that Haley was “corrupt.”

Ramaswamy attacked Haley in the opening minutes of the debate, criticizing her for accepting donations from wealthy donors, including some who have supported President Joe Biden, and for her support of the US providing aid to Ukraine.

Haley responded to attacks of her growing support from wealthy donors by dismissing Ramaswamy as “just jealous” and said she doesn’t change her positions to appease donors.

Haley and Ramaswamy have traded barbs at each of the previous three debates, with each exchange heightening the tension between the two. The source of their disagreements typically focuses on foreign policy issues, but as the two continue to clash, their attacks have become increasingly personal. The substance and tone of those moments at the fourth debate appeared to build on the history of confrontation between them, as both candidates leaned into personal attacks.

Ramaswamy reiterated his attacks on Haley’s ties to donors throughout the debate, culminating in him holding up a handwritten sign on his notepad that read “Nikki = Corrupt” as he defended himself from claims that his attacks against her were sexist.

“After the third debate, when I criticized Ronna McDaniel after five failed years of leadership of this party and criticized Nikki for her corrupt foreign dealings as a military contractor, she said that I have a woman problem. Nikki, I don’t have a woman problem. You have a corruption problem. And I think that that’s what people need to know. Nikki is corrupt,” he said, emphasizing his argument by holding up the sign, which he had written in large font on his notepad, for the audience to see.

When asked if she would like to respond to Ramaswamy’s blunt attack, Haley dismissively declined.

“No, it’s not worth my time to respond to him,” she said.

Read more about their clashes here.

Polls continue to show Donald Trump with a massive lead over his competition for the Republican presidential nomination. Yet, many of his opponents continue to hold their fire against the former president. They may be doing so in hopes of eliminating all their non-Trump competition before taking on Trump himself.

The problem with this plan is that it won’t work. Trump’s rivals have to do something different to knock him off his perch. Unlike in 2016, when there were signs that he could be defeated in a one-on-one contest (which never actually happened), Trump holds major advantages this time around.

He’s up by more than 40 points nationally when polled against his closest rivals (Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley). More than that, he is pulling in greater than 60% of the Republican vote. Even if his rivals were able to consolidate into one super candidate, Trump would still win majority support.

This is very different from where we were at this point in the 2016 cycle. Trump was getting somewhere around 25% to 30% of the GOP vote nationally.

Additionally, it’s not at all clear that any of his 2024 rivals can unite the Republican primary voters not supporting Trump. Consider a Marquette University Law School poll from last month.

Trump corralled 57% of the vote in this national survey when matched up against all of his GOP competitors. When facing just DeSantis, Trump’s support jumped to 65%. When matched up with just Haley, he got to 70% of the vote.

We didn’t see such numbers in 2016, when Trump was on his way to locking up the GOP nomination. As late as March 2016, an ABC News/Washington Post poll found Trump trailing both Marco Rubio (51% to 45%) and Ted Cruz (54% to 41%) in hypothetical one-on-one polling.

That is, there was a legitimate argument back then for Trump’s rivals hoping to become the last candidate standing against him. Today, it doesn’t make much sense.

Read the full analysis.

Months ago, Republican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy was gaining traction in the polls, backed by a populist outsider message and an attention-grabbing performance at the first primary debate. Now, the Ohio entrepreneur is still stuck in the single digits in a thinning GOP primary pack.

Former President Donald Trump – whom Ramaswamy has defended and praised repeatedly – remains the front-runner for the GOP nomination. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley are competing to be seen as the main Trump alternative in a field that has grown smaller with the recent exits of former Vice President Mike Pence and South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott.

At the Republican debate in Miami, Ramaswamy bet that attacking Republican National Committee chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, interrogating moderator Kristen Welker instead of answering the question posed to him and trying to ding Haley over her daughter’s use of TikTok would shift the national political spotlight on to him. It didn’t. A 538/Washington Post/Ipsos poll of potential GOP primary voters who watched the debate found his unfavorability rating rising 12 points to 47%.

Ramaswamy and his team have moved to redistribute staff and resources. The campaign relocated most of the staff from Columbus, Ohio, to New Hampshire and Iowa – a move campaigns often make as a strategic Hail Mary to build momentum around a strong performance in an early nominating state. The staffing shift came days after the campaign announced an approximately $10 million ad buy in Iowa and New Hampshire, its first major one of the cycle.

The Ramaswamy campaign believes these moves, coupled with his confrontational rhetoric at the Miami debate, will translate to improvements in the polls – but not right away.

“At this third debate, he definitely came out swinging, which I think everyone saw, and I think that’s kind of the tone he’s going to continue for the rest of the campaign,” campaign senior adviser Tricia McLaughlin said last month before the fourth GOP debate. “We’ve been purely reliant on earned media and on-the-ground events. We’re going to shift tactics in New Hampshire and Iowa. We’re optimistic that between a strong debate performance and earned media, that he’s going to start seeing some bumps. I don’t think we’re going to see the difference until January.”

Read more about the Ramaswamy campaign.

Four Republican presidential candidates stuck to speaking about their faith and their families during a Saturday forum in western Iowa – a stark contrast from the contentious fourth GOP debate last Wednesday, when they spent much of the evening attacking one another.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and Texas pastor Ryan Binkley attended the “Faith and Family with the Feenstras” event hosted by GOP Rep. Randy Feenstra of Iowa, with less than six weeks to make an impression on caucus-goers before the state’s first-in-the-nation nominating contest.

At Dordt University in Sioux Center, DeSantis appeared with his wife, Casey DeSantis, and argued that Democrats want to establish a religion of “secular leftism.”

“And they want that to be the orthodoxy so that if you as a Christian or another faith, if your faith conflicts with their agenda, they expect you to bend the knee. That is not religious liberty as our Founding Fathers understood it,” he said.

Nikki Haley reflected on the 2015 mass shooting that killed nine congregants in a historically Black church in Charleston during her tenure as governor of South Carolina, emphasizing she believes in “faith and family and country” because “I’ve lived it.”

GOP rival Vivek Ramaswamy, who has been fielding questions about his Hindu religion from voters during his campaign events, talked in-depth about his faith before the evangelical crowd and acknowledged that his religion “ends up being an elephant in the room at times at events” because “that’s not been a norm for US presidents in the past.”

When asked whether his campaign would work with the “Christian vision to advance the Kingdom of God in America,” Ramaswamy said, “I don’t think that’s the job of the US president.”

“I’m not running for pastor, I wouldn’t be qualified to be pastor, but I am running to be the commander in chief and to be president,” he added.

Texas pastor Ryan Binkley – who has barely registered in the polls in Iowa and did not qualify for the debate earlier this week – introduced himself to the audience and argued that “America needs an economic revival and a spiritual revival,” and vowed to reform health care.

Keep reading about the event here.