The mystery of Vivek Ramaswamy’s rapid rise in the polls

In RealClearPolitics’ average, Ramaswamy is at 6.1 percent, behind only Trump (54.2 percent) and DeSantis (15.1 percent), but ahead of Mike Pence (5.2 percent), Nikki Haley (3.4 percent), Tim Scott (2.8 percent) and Chris Christie (2.6 percent). FiveThirtyEight’s polling average shows Ramaswamy even higher, at 7.5 percent, 2 points clear of Pence for third. Ramaswamy’s strength comes almost entirely from polls conducted over the internet, according to a POLITICO analysis. And high-information, high-interest voters — those who might be called the most “online” — are also likely to be over-represented in opt-in internet polls. On the other hand, there’s one reason why Ramaswamy’s support might actually be artificially lower on the phone than in point-and-click internet polls: his name.