GOP candidate says he doesn't believe 9/11 happened as government says

Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy is furiously backpedaling after appearing to embrace 9/11 trutherism in a debate this week, reported POLITICO.

The exchange happened on Tuesday evening, during an interview with Alex Stein on the right-wing Blaze TV.

“I don’t believe the government has told us the truth,” said Ramaswamy, when Stein asked him whether he believed 9/11 was an “inside job” or happened “exactly like the government tells us.”

“I’m driven by evidence and data. What I’ve seen in the last several years is we have to be skeptical of what the government does tell us. I haven’t seen evidence to the contrary, but do I believe everything the government told us about it? Absolutely not. Do I believe the 9/11 Commission? Absolutely not.”

Ramaswamy did not directly say he believed 9/11 was an inside job, and when the clip spread on social media, he came out and clarified that he was only saying he didn't believe the government was fully revealing the details of Saudi Arabia's involvement. “Al-Qaeda clearly planned and executed the attacks, but we have never fully addressed who knew what in the Saudi government about it,” Ramaswamy posted to Twitter/X. “We *can* handle the TRUTH.”

Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur from Ohio, has run a far-right campaign largely based on attacking "wokeness."

He has also come under controversy for a strange campaign strategy in which people are eligible for "commissions" if they help him locate new donors — a strategy some critics have compared to multi-level marketing schemes, although he denies he is using such a model.