VIVEK RAMASWAMY: I Refused To Rig A Poll Now I apos;ll Fight GOP Machine

De Wikifliping

is an entrepreneur, author and candidate for the Party's presidential nomination
I am running for planet88 President to revive our But in the last week I've discovered a secondary goal that I will pursue on my way to the : exposing the corruption of the political campaign process itself.
One of my first encounters with this corruption came just days after I declared my candidacy.

My campaign team received a call from a political consultant who tried to make an offer he thought we couldn't refuse.
He was wrong.
I was due to speak at the national Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), an annual gathering of activists and influencers.
One of the signature rituals at CPAC is a 'straw poll' of the attendees to survey who they support to be the next president.
Most people who attend CPAC are hardworking, earnest conservative activists who participate because they believe their voice is not being heard.

But I learned that the CPAC straw poll isn't a fair fight.
It's presented as 'grassroots,' when really - like so many things in partisan politics - it's astroturf.
People come from all over the country and spend money on tickets to not only attend the events, but also vote in the straw poll.

The dirty little secret is that political consultants often get paid by candidates to bring attendees to CPAC to juice the results.
The more money you pay - the more voters you get. Hardly democracy in action.
The political consultant who called my team pitched to place me second in the straw poll, in return for a hefty six-figure sum.
As an outsider to this game, I was shocked.

And I said: Hell no!
I am running for President to revive our American national identity.

But in the last week I've discovered a secondary goal that I will pursue on my way to the White House: exposing the corruption of the political campaign process itself.
One of my first encounters with this corruption came just days after I declared my candidacy.

My campaign team received a call from a political consultant who tried to make an offer he thought we couldn't refuse.
I told my team that I'd take my unpaid speaking slot instead and let people judge me on merit.
Watch the video of and judge for yourself.

The five standing ovations I earned will give you an idea of the raucous reaction from the crowd.
And you'll certainly notice a mismatch between that reception and the results of the straw poll.
You'll also recognize an oddity in who else managed to place in the straw poll's top three behind Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis - an unknown businessman whom hardly anyone has heard of.
For anyone who was in the room at CPAC, the results don't pass the smell test.
Republicans love to rail against corruption in government, yet we somehow just shrug when we see it in our own backyard.
My point isn't about the CPAC organization; it's about a broken system rife with 'consultants' who grift like leeches.
Republicans rally around draining the swamp while really just festering within it.

If we're going to preach managerial reform, we've got to practice what we preach. Politics has become an industry, the process is corrupt, and it shouldn't be that way.
My campaign is going to expose how the sausage is made so voters can pick a president who isn't part of the machine.
I will never apologize for exposing corruption, wherever I see it - whether it's in the federal government when I serve as President or on the campaign trail to get there.
Most people who attend CPAC are hardworking, earnest conservative activists who participate because they believe their voice is not being heard.

But I learned that the CPAC straw poll isn't a fair fight.
If the establishment's feathers are this ruffled over my pulling the curtain back on something this minuscule, just wait.
We'll be sharing my that I actually write down, instead of reading speeches written by consultants and displayed on teleprompters.

We're going to tape my 'closed-door' policy briefings and release them to the public. We'll let people see behind the scenes to get to know the real me -- unfiltered.
I won't cherry-pick which reporters I talk to, even if they're mean to me (and yes, that includes NBC).

If you want to be the leader of the free world and stare down Xi Jinping, you can't be a crybaby about liberal journalists.
I challenge the rest of the Republican field to do the same. This shouldn't be hard.
My campaign will go further.
We're going to take aim at the political consultant class, including the high-margin business of political fundraisers, by disrupting that oligopoly and democratizing who gets to make money out of the process.

And I'm just warming up.
Next step: I'll be calling on the Republican National Committee to transparently release their criteria for deciding who makes the Republican primary debates and where they are placed on the stage.
There are some early smoke signals that the Republican establishment would rather not have me on the debate stage later this year.

They've told me I would be a distraction, endangering the party plan.
Engaging in debate with me, I think, is not something that the other candidates are going to relish.
I've publicly and privately asked the RNC, including Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, to state the criteria for placement on the debate stage.

They still haven't done that.
I've publicly and privately asked the RNC, including Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel (above), to state the criteria for placement on the debate stage.

They still haven't done that.
They want to see 'how things go,' but that's a formula for game-playing. The DNC tried to do it to Bernie in 2015.
There's no argument against full transparency and candor—that's got to be the way the Republican Party runs this and conducts itself going forward.
We can't drain the swamp in D.C.

if we don't do it in our own neighborhood.
The Republican Party machine has a long way to go to rebuild trust with our base.
No time better to start -- than now.