Entrepreneur and author of “Woke, Inc” Vivek Ramaswamy claimed China is using “woke” politics to manipulate Americans during a Wednesday appearance on “Fox and Friends.”
China has positioned itself as “uniquely off-limits” for identification as the origin country for the novel coronavirus despite the country clearly being so, Ramaswamy argued.
“The Zika virus, the Marburg virus, and Ebola, were all named after the places of origin. In fact, MERS stands for the Middle Eastern respiratory virus. That’s an older coronavirus,” Ramaswamy told “Fox & Friends.” Ramaswamy continued, noting other COVID-19 strains — such as the U.K. variant, Brazilian variant and South African variant — which refer to their place of origin. (RELATED: GOP Lawmakers Demand Investigation Into National Institutes Of Health’s Relationship With Wuhan Lab)
Ramaswamy said that despite this precedent, it has become impossible to mention the “Wuhan virus.”
“And we have to ask ourselves why, and the answer is crystal clear to me. It is that China has mastered the art of using wokeness as a geopolitical tool against the United States,” Ramaswamy continued. “And if there is any doubt about that, just look at the comments of Xi Jinping when European leaders pressed him last year on [China’s] human rights record. He cites Black Lives Matter as a way of saying the U.S. is no better. Their top diplomat in Alaska last month falsely claiming that black Americans are being slaughtered, and [that] he hopes the U.S. does better on human rights.”
Ramaswamy went on to defend Republican Ohio Lt. Gov. Jon Husted after he faced backlash for using the term “Wuhan virus.” Husted was commenting on former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Director Robert Redfield saying he believed the virus likely originated from the Wuhan lab.
So it appears it was the Wuhan Virus after all?https://t.co/zmimtlZ9Ev
Ex-CDC director says he believes coronavirus originated in Wuhan lab
— Jon Husted (@JonHusted) March 26, 2021
“They have mastered this game and they are using Americans here as pawns by now, deflecting accountability for COVID-19 by claiming that any allusion to China is now racist. And that’s laughable,” Ramaswamy said.