Mulvaney: Ramaswamy the potential loser in fourth GOP debate

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(NewsNation) —  Four Republican presidential hopefuls — Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy and former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie — took the NewsNation debate stage for a last chance to address voters ahead of the Iowa caucuses.

While he’s uncertain who won the debate, NewsNation Political Contributor Mick Mulvaney suggests Ramaswamy lost.

“I don’t know if there was a winner, but if there was a loser, it was Vivek Ramaswamy,” he said.

Mulvaney added that Ramaswamy wasn’t a “serious candidate.”

“He was in this to try it. He was a child. He was attacking people like you would in a high school debate class,” he said. “He doesn’t understand how the government works, and I think he saw folks start to sort of ignore him towards the end.”

Journalist Geraldo Rivera noted that Ramaswamy was “absolutely obnoxious” in the first hour of the debate but redeemed himself in the second hour.

“He was less bad, but he still comes across as a smug know-it-all,” Rivera said. “Maybe it’s just generational —the fact that I’m the 80-year-old they’re always making fun of. But it seems to me that he’s too glib for school.”

Ramaswamy, the stage’s youngest candidate at 38 years old, has campaigned on a message of unity but has increasingly taken shots at the other candidates during each of the three preceding debates.