An ethanol industry group is accusing Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy of being hypocritical for supporting construction of an oil pipeline, but opposing carbon pipelines.
Ramaswamy often recites what he calls the 10 “truths” on the campaign trail. One of them is that human flourishing requires fossil fuels and Ramaswamy has said construction of the Keystone XL Pipeline for crude oil should resume.
This week, Ramaswamy criticized Governor Reynolds and other Republicans for not opposing the use of eminent domain to seize land for proposed pipeline to ship carbon out of ethanol plants.
The Iowa Renewable Fuels Association says Ramaswamy’s “playing a typical political game, not driven by principles.” The group’s executive director says Ramaswamy is “a hypocrite whose campaign is running on fumes.”
At noon today, Ramaswamy and the Free Soil Coalition, a group that opposes the carbon pipelines, are holding an event in Des Moines.
“You have a lot of other Republicans that have been trained to behave like circus monkeys on this issue. You’re supposed to dance to the tune of certain puppet masters. I refuse to do that,” Ramaswamy said Tuesday while speaking to reporters at his Iowa campaign headquarters.