▶ Video
Vivek Ramaswamy, the Republican running for governor of Ohio, was caught on tape saying he doesn't like the existence of Social Security and Medicaid payments.
A newly surfaced clip shows the Republican nominee for Ohio governor saying he doesn't 'like the existence' of Social Security and Medicaid payments. It fits a record: he agreed Medicare and Medicaid were mistakes and has pitched investing Social Security money in the stock market.
Jeff Hurd declined televised debate invitations and agreed to one 30-minute session before a friendly audience instead. John McGuire says he'll debate when his opponent apologizes for raising a BlackRock sale the disclosure records in his wife's retirement account. They join fourteen Republicans we have already documented ducking the one event they can't script.
Ramaswamy's own Ohio ethics filing lists stock in the companies that make the chips, run the servers and own the land behind the data center boom. As governor he'd appoint the boards that hand out their tax breaks and approve their power plants. Asked whether he'd sell, he didn't answer.
Ramaswamy said it was legitimate to ask whether federal agents were aboard the 9/11 planes, and admitted he had no evidence. When the quote made news he said it was wrong. CNN's fact-checker reviewed the audio and found the only thing left out was a five-word fragment.
Casey Putsch spent the Republican primary saying 'Vivek won't debate me.' There was no GOP gubernatorial debate. The Libertarian nominee says he is still waiting for a commitment too.
The Sports Betting Alliance gave $650,000 to the super PAC electing Ramaswamy. Two bills to legalize online casino gambling are pending in Columbus. A reporter asked him directly. He would not answer.
Judge Julien Xavier Neals refused on Aug. 25 to dismiss Joyce Rosely's whistleblower claim against Ramaswamy personally. She says he demanded she violate securities laws, heard her objections, and helped fire her. A second former Strive employee alleged the same thing.
Ramaswamy is running for Ohio governor on taking the state's school-choice programs "to the next level." His official biography credits a teacher at his "Greater Cincinnati public school" and reduces St. Xavier — the private Jesuit school he attended grades nine through twelve — to "his Cincinnati high school."
Leaked audio published August 26 catches Ohio's Republican nominee for governor backing Miller 'up and down the ticket' — three weeks after two Republican senators told him to resign, and days after Miller's own former father-in-law said he should not serve in the House.
Someone has to pay to power the AI build-out. In Texas, Florida, Ohio, Georgia and New Mexico, these five Republicans have spent the last few years making sure it's you.
Campaign finance records show Ramaswamy paid nearly $560,000 to V Leasing LLC, whose listed address is a house he owns. A nonprofit watchdog says that if he reimburses himself for the $25 million he loaned his campaign, he will be using donors' money to pay himself.
Justin Salsburey pleaded guilty August 13 to a fentanyl and meth conspiracy run out of a Bellefontaine house. Ramaswamy's campaign kept paying his security firm for three weeks after the arrest — including $2,000 four days after publicly cutting ties.
Vivek Ramaswamy bought a discarded Alzheimer's drug for $5 million, put his mother on the payroll to reanalyze the failed trial data, and raised $315 million. Twenty days before the drug failed again, SoftBank put $1.1 billion of new equity into the parent company. A California teachers' pension fund lost more than $1 million.
Ramaswamy holds a $71 million stake in Strive, a leveraged bitcoin company that lost $257.6 million last quarter. He calls House Bill 18 'thoughtful & powerful' — and its pension language has no cap at all. Ohio's five retirement systems hold $284 billion.
A super PAC backing Vivek Ramaswamy spent $8.2 million in one month attacking his opponent. Five out-of-state donors put up 88 cents of every dollar — and $10 million of the Ohio spending shows up in the state's public database with the purpose field left blank.
Cleveland.com says both of his opponents had already released platforms while Ramaswamy relied on attack ads — until it refused to stop asking. He has never held elected office.
Ohio's electric bills are up 53% since 2021. Ramaswamy says data centers will make power free for nearby homes — a promise that runs entirely through regulators the governor appoints. Energy PACs gave him $97,468 this year, and the money roughly doubled after a watchdog flagged it.
Equality Ohio's 2026 scorecard rates Ramaswamy as having a 'poor record and likely to harm LGBTQ+ civil rights.' His record includes calling transgender identity a 'mental health disorder' and touting endorsements from the authors of Ohio's anti-trans laws.
A new analysis puts a number on Ramaswamy's promise to roll property taxes back to pre-pandemic levels: $4 billion a year in his first budget, $6.6 billion a year in his second. His plan to pay for it is growing Ohio's population by 26%.
Ramaswamy singled out four Ohio public universities as struggling and said the state shouldn't fund 'subpar' schools. After bipartisan backlash, he's pretending he never said it.
Vivek Ramaswamy is spending $10 million on ads blaming Amy Acton for Ohio's COVID rules. Cleveland.com found they overstate her part in calling off the 2020 primary — and skip his own pandemic advocacy entirely.
DOGE's charter expired on July 4, 2026. It promised $2 trillion in savings, delivered chaos and a claimed $215 billion, and its co-founder Vivek Ramaswamy bailed early — to run for Governor of Ohio.
Asked point-blank by the Wall Street Journal if he'd push so-called 'right-to-work' in Ohio, Vivek Ramaswamy dodged — and wouldn't say no to a policy that lowers wages and weakens unions.
Ramaswamy's campaign for Ohio governor has hidden more than half a million dollars in spending behind a single credit card line — in a state where Republicans just gutted the independent watchdog.
Ramaswamy wants to wipe out Ohio's capital gains tax. His own tax returns show it would save him roughly $5.8 million — while costing Ohio's schools and hospitals hundreds of millions a year.
