“I do not want to see us become a banana republic where the administrative police state uses police force to eliminate opponents from competition. That's not the way it works,” Ramaswamy said 
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“I do not want to see us become a banana republic where the administrative police state uses police force to eliminate opponents from competition. That's not the way it works,” Ramaswamy said On Sunday, Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican presidential aspirant, said that while he is expecting to be the party's nominee for the November 2024 US elections, but in case former president Donald Trump secures the nomination, he will vote for him.
Ramaswamy appeared on a Sunday talk show, where the 38-year-old Indian American entrepreneur-turned-politician said he would pardon Trump because that would help reunite the country.
“If Donald Trump’s the nominee —yes, I will support him, and if I’m the president, yes, I will pardon him because that will help reunite the country. But it’s not the most important thing I’m going to do as the next president. It is the table stakes for moving this country forward,” he said.
Ramaswamy showed an impressive performance in the inaugural Republican primary presidential debate last month; after that, he experienced an increase in popularity, competing alongside fellow Indian American rival Nikki Haley, the former Governor of South Carolina.
Ramaswamy is notably the sole Republican presidential hopeful to openly endorse Trump, who is facing multiple charges and is currently out on bail, and his 'America First' policies, including stances on issues like climate change.
“My bottom line is that I will vote for the person who I think is best positioned to move this country forward. I do not think that's Joe Biden. I do not think that is whichever other puppet, Kamala Harris or anybody else, that they roll out after Joe Biden,” Ramaswamy said.
Ramaswamy stated that even though he may disagree with several of his Republican colleagues on various topics, he is adamant that any of them would be more successful than Biden or Harris at guiding the US in the right direction.
"That is my arbitrator when I cast my vote for who the next president is -- who's going to serve the interests of the American people? That's not some sort of commitment driven by vengeance or grievance. It is driven by a commitment to our purpose as citizens of this country,” he said.
“That’s what we need to revive in the United States, our civic spirit, remembering that even the 'America First' movement is bigger than Donald Trump. It is bigger than me. It is bigger than one political candidate," Ramaswamy added.
Ramaswamy said the 'America First' movement belongs to the people of the US, the same people who still retain the power to elect their next president, and he aims to preserve this system rather than see it replaced by a federal police state determining the nation's leadership, "and I stand by that without apology”. He further said that he is in the US presidential race because he expects to be the Republican nominee and lead the country forward.
He went ahead and said that, in his opinion, many of the charges against Trump are politically motivated and set a detrimental precedent for the United States.
“I do not want to see us become a banana republic where the administrative police state uses police force to eliminate opponents from competition. That's not the way it works,” he said.
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