Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy has opted out of the Department of Government Efficiency of which he was the co-leader along with tech tycoon Elon Musk. He will quit the project as he plans to run for the governor of Ohio, said reports.
His exit was confirmed by the White House, which thanked Ramaswamy for playing a critical role in helping create DOGE. Anna Kelly, a spokeswoman for the White House, said "We thank him immensely for his contributions over the last two months and expect him to play a vital role in making America great again!"
Though there was no official confirmation from the side of Ramaswamy, sources close to him told The New York Times that he would begin a bid in Ohio later this year. Though he didn't plan on quitting immediately, Ramaswamy "recently came to see the idea of co-leading the efficiency effort and running for office at the same time as unworkable," the source added.
However, a report that appeared in Politico hints that Ramaswamy was booted out of DOGE. And, it was none other than Elon Musk who helped his departure. Musk is said to have made his displeasure about Ramaswamy vocal in private conversations and wanted him out.
Sources close to Musk told Politico that an ill-received holiday rant on X by Ramaswamy about H-1B visas hastened his exit. A Republican strategist close to Trump's advisers told Politico that Ramaswamy "just burned through the bridges and he finally burned Elon." "Everyone wants him out of Mar-a-Lago, out of D.C.," he said.
When the issue of H-1B visas came up, Ramaswamy tweeted: "The reason top tech companies often hire foreign-born & first-generation engineers over 'native' Americans isn't because of an innate American IQ deficit (a lazy & wrong explanation). A key part of it comes down to the c-word: culture," Ramaswamy wrote.
"A culture that celebrates the prom queen over the math olympiad champ, or the jock over the valedictorian, will not produce the best engineers ... If you grow up aspiring to normalcy, normalcy is what you will achieve."
His tweet drew a backlash from MAGA supporters. "They wanted him out before the tweet — but kicked him to the curb when that came out," Politico quoted one of the three people familiar with his departure.
Musk also felt it was not feasible for him to campaign for office while working on DOGE. Sources close to Ramaswamy believe they are still on good terms but "the reality is that it wasn’t possible" to run for governor and co-lead DOGE together.
Meanwhile, a meme portraying Musk erasing Ramaswamy from history was privately shared by junior staff in House Speaker Mike Johnson’s office. It depicted Musk as Josef Stalin and Ramaswamy as the chief of the Soviet secret police who was later executed and removed from photos, according to the report.