Ramaswamy Rips CNN for 'Shenanigans,' Skips Debate

Tech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy blasted CNN's "shenanigans" on social media Tuesday, accusing the network of unfair coverage of his 2024 Republican presidential campaign before a primary debate it's hosting next week.

In a lengthy post on X, Ramaswamy predicted the CNN debate will be "the most boring in modern history" and said that he will skip the event and do a live-audience show in Des Moines, Iowa, with podcaster Tim Pool.

Ramaswamy fired off a litany of grievances against CNN and its coverage of his campaign, providing several examples in which he says the network treated him unfairly.

"On Dec 13, CNN disgracefully cut short its own Iowa town hall with me after I correctly pointed out uncomfortable truths about Jan 6, which CNN instantly dismissed as 'conspiracy theories,'" Ramaswamy wrote.

"On Dec 14, CNN then threatened my campaign on the phone with a cease-and-desist & had YouTube black out the town hall after it got 200k+ views on YouTube in a matter of hours," he said. "Yet Nikki Haley's CNN town hall was still up after 6 months (68k total views, sad)."

"Later on Dec 14, CNN notified my campaign that multiple qualifying polls, which the RNC used for each of the RNC Debates, mysteriously wouldn't count for CNN's fake 'debate' in Iowa on January 10," he added.

Ramaswamy's eligibility for the debate is questionable, as he has been polling in the single digits.

No stranger to controversy, he was widely criticized following a heated exchange with former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley during the third Republican primary debate and circulated a petition calling on Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel to step down after recent party losses.

This isn't the first time Ramaswamy has taken a swipe at CNN; in August he branded CNN host Kaitlan Collins a "petulant teenager" in a social media post after a contentious interview.

Ramaswamy, along with other GOP primary candidates, including Haley and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, trails far behind former President Donald Trump in the polls.

Trump has thus far declined to attend all the Republican primary debates, citing his yawning lead over his rivals for the nomination.

• GOP Candidates Spending More Than $112M in Iowa
• Ramaswamy to Newsmax: I’ll ‘Shatter Expectations’ in Iowa