Vivek Ramaswamy claims protesters wrecked his car – but police say no

Police have turned up no evidence to back claims made by Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy’s campaign about protesters crashing a car into their vehicle.

Ramaswamy’s campaign had said two protesters at an event in Grinnell, Iowa, had struck their rental vehicle, but police said a woman who had no connection to the protest had eaten lunch at a nearby deli and struck the car while backing out of a parking space, reported Politico.

"[The driver] stated she was not in the area to protest, she did not know who the vehicle she struck belonged to, she did not intentionally back into the vehicle, and she did not flee the scene of the accident,” police said in a statement.

Police filed a report and the driver was released with a summons for unsafe backing.

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However, Ramaswamy senior adviser Tricia McLaughlin posted a photo and video on X, the site formerly known as Twitter, that shows a person flipping off the GOP candidate but did not show the collision.

The candidate himself doubled down on his campaign's claim.

“Suppose a guy wearing a MAGA hat is standing amongst protesters at a Democrat presidential candidate’s event, then gets into his car with aggressive bumper stickers, flips off the candidate & screams profanities, lays on his horn, and then reverse-rams the candidate’s parked SUV,” Ramaswamy posted on in response to the police’s statement.

“I’m sure they’d be just as eager to call it an unrelated accident, right?”