The Star News Network’s national political editor Matt Kittle sat in Tuesday to guest host The Simon Conway Show, broadcast live from WHO Des Moines, an iHeart radio station at KDRB 100.3HZ, where he interviewed Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.
TRANSCRIPT
Matt Kittle: Next is a gentleman who’s had, well, to say the very least, a very good week.
At least I would say that – and I’ve covered the Vivek Ramaswamy, Ohio entrepreneur and anti-woke crusader.
How are you, sir? Welcome to the Simon Conway Show. So glad to talk to you again.
Vivek Ramaswamy: I’m doing great. It’s great to be back. How are you?
Matt Kittle: I’m good, but I think you’re better. I took a look at the latest poll today that’s out. You’re running in third place.
That’s I think the third straight poll where you are just behind Ron DeSantis.
It looks like there is some erosion going on, at least in one of those major polls of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis.
And you had a very good weekend, of course, between Des Moines and West Palm Beach. What’s the secret sauce?
Vivek Ramaswamy: Well, look, I think the secret sauce is, ‘speak the truth and do it without apology.’ And I think that that’s what we’re doing throughout this entire campaign is speaking the hard truths that other people are unwilling or unable to say.
And I think part of what we’re doing is also I’m offering very specific solutions on how we’re going to address some of the problems that Republicans have been talking about for a long time.
Shutting down the administrative state – exactly how we do it.
Declaring independence from Communist China – exactly how we do it.
Revive national pride amongst young Americans; growing the economy.
And so I do think that this specificity is something that I think many voters are hungry for, especially in our base. But one of the things that I’m also seeing is that, I think it takes an outsider to be able to speak the truth as unsparingly as I am.
I think that’s something that’s really landing with the voters and we’re grateful for the lift that we’ve seen.
Matt Kittle: GOP Presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy joining us this hour on the Davidson Family Dentistry Newsmaker Line on the Simon Conway Show.
You’re making news – I mean, that’s the thing.
You are 37 years old. You are the only millennial Republican running. That’s something to say in and of itself that makes news.
But every day you’re making headlines. Today you’re making headlines by pulling from the very successful Donald Trump page of strategy where, in his campaign, he announced what kind of judges, what kind of justices he would have on the Supreme Court – and he drew from the Federalist Society.
You’ve done something similar, have you not?
Vivek Ramaswamy: I did.
I think it’s important to be transparent with voters about exactly what we’re gonna do in office.
And so as I am with my policy proposals, I wanted to begin to be very specific with personnel and with appointments as well. So I laid out the first wave of likely judicial appointments, both for the Supreme Court and for appellate courts, which are also very important.
This has actually been in the works for months. We have carefully vetted that – I have been taking advice from a number of outside conservative legal groups, law professors, internal team vetting, but I’m really serious about actually translating a lot of our policy vision, and I’m not gonna be in a position to do that.
Shutting down administrative agencies – one of the things that’s often cited is that there are legal obstacles to doing it.
Well I believe the U.S. president can take certain steps to shut down the US Department of Education or cut over 90 percent of the employees in the U.S. Federal Reserve.
But these ideas will be contested and sorted out in the Supreme Court.
So I thought it was very important for me to let the voters know, here’s exactly – not only who they’re gonna get in me – but who they’re going to get in their federal judges. And that’s the first step of further transparency we’re gonna provide in what my other appointments will look like in what my other day-one actions will look like.
And I do think that that’s, again, part of what I think is driving our, frankly, surge in the polls. It’s been, it’s been a vertical rise in the last several weeks.
But I think a part of that has been driven by now, I’ve introduced myself as an individual. People know my story. I’ve lived the American dream.
But now as we’re really digging into the specifics, I can really see our base responding.
And I’m grateful for that, but I still think we’re just getting warmed up.
Matt Kittle: You have some very interesting names on this list, but I want to get to the name you don’t have on here, and that is one Judge Steven Colleton, who just turned 54 this year.
He is a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the eighth circuit. He is also from Iowa. He has definitely made some headlines. He’s been very active as a judge. He typically rules on the conservative side, but he has a bit of a mixed record when it comes to things like the Second Amendment.
I know there are a lot of quality jurists out there. There are a lot of bad jurists out there too.
But why was Stephen Colleton omitted from this list? I know that former President Donald Trump had him on the short list years ago.
Vivek Ramaswamy: Well, look, I think that there are outstanding jurists and judges who are not on a short list for being on the U.S. Supreme Court.
So I think that there’s, just because someone doesn’t appear on my very short list of Supreme Court potential nominees. It doesn’t mean that they’re a bad judge or that there’s something wrong with them. But the criteria I used for this particular list was an originalist understanding of the Constitution, but with an understanding of the unique threats in the 21st century, and that’s how we put our list together.
Matt Kittle: Very good.
We’ll have to leave it there. There’s so much more to talk about, but again, an outstanding week by all accounts and very interesting headline-making again today. Good luck on the campaign trail.
Vivek Ramaswamy: Thank you. We’re just getting warmed up.
Matt Kittle: You bet. Appreciate it. The Vivek Ramaswamy joining us on this edition of The Simon Conway Show with yours truly, Matt Kittle.
More to come stay with us.
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Photo “Vivek Ramaswamy” by Vivek Ramaswamy.
