Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said Wednesday that he'd put "him in charge of one of these big monsters" in his administration if elected, extending an offer of a place in the administration to onetime rival Vivek Ramaswamy, calling him his one-time "nasty" competition.
"I think he's smart as hell," Trump said about Ramaswamy, an Indian American entrepreneur who gave the former Republican president and sexagenarian a run for his money during their nomination bid.
Trump took his campaign for the White House to Scranton, Pennsylvania, the hometown of President Joe Biden, Wednesday.
"He's really smart, and I hope he's going to be involved in our administration," he said. "We can put him in charge of one of these big monsters [in government] and he'll do a better job than anybody you can think of."
Warm-up speaker Ramaswamy for Trump's next rally in neighboring Reading found some historical precedent - George Washington, the Father of the Nation - in the hyperbole of the former president.
Trump, who followed, elaborated on his earlier Scranton statement saying that "he's going to be a part of something that's going to be really big."
To thunderous cheers from the crowd, he said, "I don't want to tell him yet exactly [his position]. We're gonna pick the right [one]."
Trump said he didn't want to reveal what job he had in mind because "I don't like talking first. I like to win. We gotta win.".
Oh, sir, who's going to be Secretary of State'. I said, 'Do me a favor. Let's win first. Okay'? he said.
Donald Trump and Democratic Party candidate Kamala Harris, the US Vice President, are sparring at the polls' margin of error with a 2 per cent lead for her nationally.
This was Trump's second campaign trip within a week to the state that he lost narrowly in 2020 after winning it in 2016.
On Saturday, Trump addressed a rally in Butler, where he was wounded in a sniper attack in August. He addressed the two rallies on Wednesday.
At the earlier rally in Scranton, Trump recalled the fight for the party nomination before Ramaswamy dropped out to support him.
"I had to compete with this guy, and I thought it was going to be easy, but it wasn't. He was nasty. He was quick. He's smart as hell. And he knew things which a lot of people didn't know and didn't understand," he said.
"He did amazingly well, because he started really as a rookie, right? And he got up and he wiped a lot of very smart politicians off the stage," Trump said.
"And then one day he came up to me, he goes, 'You know, I don't think I'm gonna beat you'," he said.
While running against Trump, Ramaswamy had accused him of "making false promises," of being "downright abhorrent" for not accepting his defeat in the 2020 election, and "sore loser."
Trump had accused him of doing "deceitful campaign tricks," and not being a true member of his Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement.
In his address in Reading, being so over-the-top, as Trump was, Ramaswamy said, "it is a 1776 moment in this country," the year the American Declaration of Independence was made and the Revolution against British rule began.
"We need our George Washington to cross the Delaware," he said in comparison to a pivotal moment in the American Revolution. "When George Washington did it, they shot bullets at him.".
He is the George Washington of our moment, he said, referencing the assassination attempts.
As an Indian-American Hindu, so poignantly did Ramaswamy say: "The best days are still yet ahead of us, so we will look our kids in the eye and mean it when we tell them that no matter who you are or where your parents came from, or what your skin color is, that you get ahead in the US with your hard work, your commitment, your dedication.".
Ironically, however, in this presidential election, Harris embodies just that.
The other Indian-American who sought the Republican nomination, Nikki Haley, has announced she's on "standby" to campaign for Trump.
"He's aware that I'm ready if he ever needs me to do that," she told a TV show last August, though hasn't been invited to give a talk at any of the rallies yet.
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