Who is Vivek Ramaswamy? A look at the entrepreneur who’s made a name for himself in the GOP primary

Vivek Ramaswamy, a health care and tech sector entrepreneur, conservative commentator and author who has become a crusader in the culture wars, declared his candidacy in the Republican presidential primary in February.

Born in Cincinnati, Ramaswamy quickly made a name for himself on the campaign trail.

Ramaswamy, who was dubbed "the CEO of Anti-Woke Inc." in a New Yorker magazine profile last year, said earlier this year that his campaign is "about the unapologetic pursuit of excellence in our country. It means you believe in merit; that you get ahead in this country not on the color of your skin but on the content of your character and your contributions."

In an interview with Fox News Digital earlier this month, Ramaswamy said that he wants to answer "the question of what it means to be American in the year 2023."

"I’m 37 years old. When you ask people my age and younger what it means to be American today, you get a blank stare," he said.

Ramaswamy has called for a "total decoupling" from Communist China , which he argues is a greater threat to America today than the Soviet Union was during the Cold War because China makes the "shoes on our feet and the phones in our pockets.”

As the son of Indian migrants who legally came through America's "front door," Ramaswamy is a strong supporter of merit-based immigration and would not grant leniency for those who broke the law when entering the country.

Other top priorities of his include "restoring free speech," which would involve making political expression a civil right and banning Big Tech censorship executed at the behest of the government, and "dismantling" affirmative action and the "new climate religion," which he calls a "cancer on the American soul."