I guess people are just really bored because there’s a lot of pointless speculation going on out there about who the Republicans are going to run in 2028. There are a lot of people playing up Marco Rubio, and that’s no surprise. Why shouldn’t he add the job of president to the 62 other jobs on his 49-page résumé? He’s been a terrific Secretary of State, helping guide what’s arguably the most important transformation of American grand strategy since World War II as we shift away from Europe, redefine the Middle East, and pivot to face off against our pacing threat, China, in the Indo-Pacific. But he’s not going to be the Republican nominee in 2028, with an asterisk that we will follow up on below. The nominee will be JD Vance, with that same asterisk.
Why is it going to be JD Vance? Just because it is. Trump’s been hinting at that, and what he says goes in the GOP. JD is his vice president. He’s the logical guy. And he’s the guy everybody assumes it will be. Consensus matters. So, he’s going to be the guy. The base is happy with that. Just look at the polls. He’s usually way far ahead, often followed by Don Jr., who’s not going to run and who probably shouldn’t even be in the polling. Trailing him is Marco Rubio. And then there are some other candidates, like Ron DeSantis, Ted Cruz, and Tom Cotton, down below, none of whom are going to win the nomination this time, though some of them, like Ted Cruz, might actually run. I don’t know why he’d run, but he’s an appellate lawyer, and they think in weird ways. Let’s just say the 2028 GOP primary is going to be about as exciting and shocking as Mike Pence’s wedding night.
JD Vance is smart, he’s got a compelling story, and the base loves him. His big advantage is that he is the vice president. That’s also his big disadvantage. As a vice president to Donald Trump, he’s not merely playing second fiddle. Trump isn’t a first fiddle. He’s an entire orchestra. It’s easy to get lost in the glorious chaos. But Vance has been getting big jobs. Trump sent him to negotiate with the Iranians. I guess the mullahs thought they would roll him since he has a reputation for being less hawkish. They got nothing from him. Now, he’s got the fraud portfolio, and he’s making the most of that. Fraud is going to be a huge deal this election cycle and in future elections. While the Democrat Party is a cynical machine, most Americans are still pretty Puritan about the whole corruption thing, even the liberal ones. The Learing Center scam backlash hits at the heart of what Democrats do, which is take public money and divide it up among their various constituencies. Normal people don’t like that. They consider it graft, not just the way business is done. In other words, the entire Democrat business model is at risk, and Trump has handed Vance the potential for being the face of reform. Lots of politicians have made a name for themselves cleaning up corruption, and Vance, with his constant press conferences, understands that this is a way to build out an identity of his own.
But some are playing up Rubio, in part because they fear Vance is too radical. Rubio’s not getting any help from these erstwhile supporters. A lot of them are hoping he’s a Cuban Nikki Haley, a secret Bushie wearing a Trump suit that he’ll strip off the moment the Bad Orange Man steps off-stage for good. Perhaps they remember Marco Rubio’s ill-fated dalliance with amnesty over a decade ago, a miscalculation that sent him into the wilderness for years until Trump brought him back. Marco isn’t stupid. He’s not dumb enough to believe, as the Never Trumpers do, that Republicans are just waiting for the Trump Era to end and for them to be invited back to take over the Republican Party again and resume their cautious, sober management of America’s decline.
Fortunately, Marco has handled this “help” by ignoring it. He obviously wants to be president, like every politician, but he’s not saying so. He’s not even hinting at it. He’s just doing his jobs, all 77 of them, and he’s not challenging JD Vance. But he’s watching JD Vance. Marco is watching JD very carefully to see if maybe, just maybe, 2028 will be his turn.
Now, JD might be involved in a scandal, but that’s unlikely; the guy is squeaky clean, and anyway, scandals don’t seem to exist anymore. There’s also a microscopic chance that JD Vance will have some falling out with Donald Trump and lose the endorsement that we all kind of assume is coming. That’s very unlikely. For all the hopes and dreams of the misguided, there is no way that JD Vance is going to form a center of opposition to Trump’s policies within the Trump administration. Part of that is because he’s not stupid, and the other part is because he doesn’t disagree with Trump on all that much; to the extent their policies are not a Venn diagram consisting of a circle, there’s only a marginal difference between them. A Marine who served in Iraq, he’s probably a little more reticent about the Iran War than others, but you haven’t heard one word from him that can be construed as opposition. He’s not going to defy the boss.
There is another reason he might not ultimately seek the 2028 nomination. He might not run because he might not want to become the nominee. Now, that’s an intriguing notion. One reason might be that he is convinced 2028 is a loser year for the GOP and wants to wait for a better shot rather than risk a loss. But that’s unlikely because the 2028 frontrunner for the Democrats is Kamala Harris, a Chardonnay-soaked mental defective with a proven track record of failure who gives no indication of breaking her losing streak. If she runs, and she is going to run, she’s going to get the nomination – what, do you think the Democrats are going to say no to a female-identifying person of color who sounds like every obnoxious wine woman with a HATE HAS NO HOME HERE sign planted in front of her condo? Sorry, Gavin Newsom, but you just can’t compete with her genital credentials.
No, he is not going to be scared out of running. The only reason JD Vance doesn’t run in 2028 is that JD Vance chooses not to run, and while that’s a possibility, a remote possibility, it’s still a possibility. His wife, Usha, is very smart, very assertive, and very pregnant – there’s another Vance kid coming along this summer. She may very well not want him to run – the fact that they’ve tried to murder his boss three times and that they would gladly do the same to her husband is probably always on her mind. And he doesn’t have to run in 2028. JD is young, has a young family, and knows he’s got time.
He might just take a pass on 2028. If the nominee, who would likely be Rubio, loses, then he’s got great placement for 2032. And if Rubio wins, Vance can take his shot in 2036 with the argument that he is the logical guy to complete the Trump Revolution.
That’s the asterisk – JD Vance deciding, probably for family reasons, to take a pass on 2028. I give that about a 10% chance, a tiny chance, but I am saying there’s a chance. And that decision would leave Rubio, the heir-slightly-less-apparent, perfectly positioned to slide into the nom as the loyal cabinet member waiting on the bench. And, if Vance loses in 2028, well, there’s 2032, and that’s when Rubio leverages his more mainstream reputation after the more hardcore Vance is rejected. But remember that these labels and these alleged degrees of hardness are mostly illusory – Rubio has shown zero reluctance to fully exercise his power in the foreign policy realm, and there’s no indication he would be one of those old-school Republican sissies in the domestic policy realm. He’s just less polarizing than Trump – everybody is, but he is also less polarizing than Vance. That’s his advantage.
Rubio is smart, too. He’s going to keep being loyal and keep doing his many, many jobs. His fans do him no favors by trying to stoke his ambitions or launch trial balloons about him running for the lead role next time. The fact is, we’re probably going to see a Vance–Rubio ticket. It’s the logical move, and, vitally, it’s the move that Donald Trump seems to want to see. That would pit two GOP superstars against Kamala Harris, and, probably, Pete Buttigieg, since she will have learned her lesson and will choose somebody more masculine than Tim Walz next time.
So, ignore the Rubio hype. Focus on the midterms and ignore the people talking out of their fourth point of contact about what’s going to happen in 2028. We know what’s going to happen in 2028, at least on the Republican side, and we have a pretty good idea what’s going to happen on the Democrat side as well. It’s going to be a very boring primary season. But, as for the general election? I like our odds.
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