Vivek Ramaswamy has picked up a lot of steam in recent months in his quest to become the Republican presidential candidate. But as with any politician, he's faced a lot of criticism and his most recent public quarrel is from fellow Harvard graduate and alleged former classmate.
Pablo Torre, a former ESPN host who left for Meadowlark Media in April, spoke on his podcast 'Pablo Torre Finds Out' on Sept. 26 and described his experience being in the same class as Ramaswamy as a freshman. He described Ramaswamy as "that guy" in school, which Torre defined as such:
"'That Guy' is insanely ambitious, he's incredibly image conscious — he cares about how he appears. But he is totally undeterred by how much the people around him are all cringing at how awful and uncomfortable all of this is."
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Torre, who still guests on ESPN shows occasionally, also spoke on MSNBC's "11th Hour" a few days later, admitting that he and Ramaswamy were not friends but that they were in class together. He retold a similar narrative to the one on his podcast including how Ramaswamy allegedly raises his hand in class in the shape of a "V."
"He would raise his hand in the shape of a 'V' and it was like he was shining his own bat signal for terrible libertarian takes as a freshman in college," Torre said. "The dude has been ridiculous for 20 years ... The dude is doing Obama karaoke in front of everybody and daring you to think that, 'Okay, this is what a smart person looks like.' And it's what an extreme ridiculous person looks like."
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The New York Post said in a story that it reached out to Ramaswamy to get his comment on the matter and his senior adviser and communications director Tricia McLaughlin responded via email with this statement:
"While Vivek doesn’t recall ever meeting this gentleman, we wish Pablo the very best and hope he finds success in his career and life whether that be through talking about former classmates as he is now or possibly through something more productive like creating jobs or building a business as Vivek has done."
Torre responded to that story in The Post and the statement from Ramaswamy's team by simply saying "lol."
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