Gov. Ron DeSantis’ (R-Fla.) Super PAC told him to call biotech entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy “Vivek the Fake” or “Fake Vivek” in the upcoming Republican presidential primary debate, but neither of those ones really seemed to fit.
Now, Twitter users have landed on VivekGPT, a nod to how the popular AI ChatGPT tool performs, giving you any answer you want as long as you ask him the question the right way.
ChatGPT is a large language model that users can “chat” with and receive what seems like natural answers. But ChatGPT has also been criticized for not returning consistent responses and tailoring its output to the way a question is asked.
Now, it’s being used on the breakout Republican candidate.
“‘VivekGPT’ is as close to perfection as nicknames get. Kudos to whomever came up with it,” wrote Twitter user @PowerOwn45.
“VivekGPT doesn’t care about beliefs or if the claim makes sense,” wrote @AGHamilton29. “He just automatically calculates how he can frame the convo to appeal to a specific subgroup of voters,” calling him a “ChatGPT” candidate.
His position on COVID-19, in particular, has been called out as GPT-esque.
Ramaswamy has been critical of the U.S. government’s COVID pandemic response during his campaign and he criticized the idea that the disease has a natural origin. But the biotech entrepreneur’s company Datavant also pitched a data repository for COVID patients, which some conservatives have dubbed a “COVID passport.”
“LMAO VivekGPT tried to sell a Covid passport system to the government,” pointed out @redneckskeptic. “He’s hardly pro-medical choice. Unless you believe his words vs his actions.”
Ramaswamy has also been criticized for blatantly inconsistent positions, like when he denied suggesting pardoning members of Biden’s family, which he did suggest doing, or his recent hullabaloo over 9/11, where he claimed then denied he claimed the attack was an inside job. Today, Twitter users also highlighted how that same sort of flip-flopping inconsistency reared its head when it came to whether Trump should appear at the Republican presidential debate tomorrow.
“It would be fundamentally uncourageous for Donald Trump to choose not to debate,” Ramaswamy is shown saying in a video posted by Twitter user @AGHamilton29.
The video then cuts to Ramaswamy being asked if he thinks Trump should attend the first Republican debate.
“I don’t have a strong opinion on it,” he answers, before a hard cut to Ramaswamy standing in front of his campaign bus.
“Trump will be there because as I’ve known him, he’s not a man to be afraid,” Ramaswamy says.
“This is bizarre to watch,” commented a Republican communications strategist, Matt Whitlock. “[H]ow does he take fifteen different positions on whether or not Trump should debate in just like 2 months? VivekGPT is spot on.”
The name was almost perfect for Twitter user @DastDn, who had only one problem with it.
“Super torn. On the one hand, the temptation to refer to Ramaswamy as VivekGPT from now own is nigh unbearable. On the other – that a whole 3 extra letters.”
Twitter user @FilmLadd summed it up succintly: “VivekGPT and ChatGPT both suffer from the problems of making s–t up and not knowing what’s real and what isn’t.”
