Vivek Ramaswamy Drops Out Of Race After Receiving Elon Musk 'Kiss Of Death' And Coming In Last In Iowa

Heading into last night's Iowa Republican Primary caucus, the prognosis wasn't good for Vivek Ramaswamy according to many experts. For starters, he was polling in 4th, well behind Donald Trump and distant runners-up Nikki Haley and Ron DeSantis, and he also seemed to be the preferred candidate of Elon Musk, which some have noted is becoming something of a "kiss of death" for any politician.

Musk has had a poor track record with his political prognostication. In 2022, he predicted a "massive red wave" for Republicans in the 2022 midterms that never materialized. He also endorsed Rick Caruso in the Los Angeles mayoral election that year, which Caruso lost.

Sure enough, after Musk predicted that Ramaswamy would far exceed his polling numbers, Ramaswamy landed exactly where it was predicted he would, winning only 8 percent of the evening's vote. After the dismal showing, Ramaswamy suspended his campaign and endorsed Trump.

🚨VIVEK: "As of this moment we are going to be suspending this Presidential campaign… This has to be an America First candidate in that White House… Earlier tonight I called Donald Trump… and now going forward he will have my full endorsement for President." pic.twitter.com/GdcSzKPf3z

— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) January 16, 2024

Ramaswamy's departure from the race added to today's Elon Musk pile-on that appears to be somewhat of a routine occurrence on Twitter / X. While it seemed half of his critics were dunking on Tesla owners unable to get into their cars because it's cold being, the other half was roasting his demonstrated inability to read the tea leaves of American political races.

When Elon posts about politics

pic.twitter.com/AyUdM8xP13

— 🐶 𝔼𝕒𝕣𝕝 of FrunkPuppy 🐶 (@28delayslater) January 16, 2024

Musk also previously helped Ron DeSantis launch his presidential campaign earlier last year, but DeSantis finished 30 points behind Trump in Iowa and has consistently polled well behind the former President in the polls.