Ramaswamy clears GOP debate donor hurdle as Pence scrambles

Vivek Ramaswamy said Monday he qualified for the first Republican presidential debate by meeting the minimum requirements for donors and poll numbers. But ex-Vice President Mike Pence is lagging behind to qualify to get on the debate stage.

The upstart White House candidate says he he has scored the needed 40,000 donors and enough support in recognized polls to make the debate stage, joining other top tier candidates like former President Donald Trump, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, Sen. Tim Scott, Nikki Haley and Chris Christie.

“The RNC’s debate stage criteria are stringent but fair,” Ramaswamy said in a statement announcing that he hit the mark.

Pence, arguably the most well-known candidate, is still scrambling to qualify for the Aug. debate. He says his campaign is working “flat out” to score enough donors.

Ramaswamy, a little-known biotech entrepreneur, appeared to be needling Pence and other GOP wannabes by bragging that they have squandered big advantages that he did not have.

“I am a first-time candidate who started with very low name ID, no political donors, and no pre-existing fundraising lists,” Ramaswamy said. “If an outsider can clear the bar, politically experienced candidates should be able to as well: if you can’t hit these metrics by late August, you have absolutely no chance of defeating Joe Biden in the general election.”

Trump has suggested that he may skip the debate since he holds commanding leads in most polls of the GOP field.

For all the others, being on the stage is a virtual must as they seek to keep their campaigns alive amid single-digit poll numbers.

One lower-tier candidate managed to crash the debate party with a unique gimmick: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, a self-funded tech mogul, is handing out $20 gift cards to any donor who contributes even $1 to his long-shot campaign.

The debate looms as DeSantis faces increasingly serious questions about his slumping campaign.

Once seen as a golden boy with a strong chance of knocking off Trump, the Florida governor has been suffered a string of setbacks, including a disastrous campaign launch plagued by tech glitches on Twitter.

The DeSantis campaign recently announced a reboot stressing more national and smaller-scale campaign events along with cost-cutting measures.

He is now clinging to second place in the race as GOP voters have mostly rallied around Trump.

Scott and Ramaswamy are both closing in on DeSantis in national polls and Christie is showing signs of doing the same in New Hampshire, where Trump-skeptical independents can vote in the first-in-the-nation GOP primary.