Caucus Bytes: The Return of Da Vek

I always like to write about the Iowa Caucuses and specifically, the wonderfully weird events that come out of them. 

In lieu of longform blogging, I am going to share periodical bits that I will call Caucus Bytes. 

 And there is no better spot to start this election cycle than Vivek Ramaswamy. 

In a Republican race that is seemingly still open to three or four front runners, Ramaswamy is finding a slot. I read an article this June in Politico that talked about his interest in Eminem 

“I saw myself, honestly, making it big through American capitalism, and that’s why the Eminem story spoke to me,” Ramaswamy, now 37 years old, said in an interview. A friend, who watched him rap at some point in his twenties, provided footage of it. 

Which of course, we all love music, but it doesn’t end there. 

Like Beto O’Rourke, Ramaswamy made something of his interest. Rapping in front of a crowd of 3000 in Harvard prior to a Busta Rhymes show, he found his niche. 

Over the next four years, Ramaswamy became a regular at Harvard open-mic nights, where he often rapped “Lose Yourself.” He also experimented with lyrics tinged with libertarian themes, which he would embrace down the road as he became more politically active The Harvard Crimson, the university’s student newspaper, first caught wind of “Da Vek” in 2006, when Ramaswamy was in his senior year. The paper described Ramaswamy as someone who could go back and forth between two different personas: “The Chairman,” named for his role atop the Harvard Political Union, and his rapper alter-ego. Da Vek “only emerges when Ramaswamy is outfitted entirely in black, complete with a black Kangol hat,” the Crimson said. 

So I wasn’t that caught off guard when Ramaswamy rapped some bars at the Iowa State Fair 

Nah, just kidding. 

Politicians rapping will always be weird. 

(Bonus points to Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds, aged 64 who picked up Vivek's micdrop and says she had no idea of the song. Reynolds appointed and later fired Tupac obsessee Jerry Foxhoven, the former director of Iowa’s Department of Human Services, (who sent an email celebrating the rapper Tupac Shakur to all 4,300 agency employees in 2019)