Why Trump keeps asking 'Vance or Rubio?'
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
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What roles is Marco Rubio currently holding in Trump's administration?
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Marco Rubio is hitting his stride. He's Trump's top national security advisor and his Secretary of State. He's taken over the White House press briefing, sat down with the Pope, and is now in China for Trump's showdown with President Xi. So, no wonder speculation is growing that he could be the next Republican presidential nominee instead of the one-time favourite, J.D. Vance. Today, Jeff Cabaservis from the centre-right think tank, the Niskanen Centre, on the new political battle in the US. I'm Sam Hawley on Gadigal land in Sydney. This is ABC News Daily.
Geoff, there's this story during the rounds in Washington, D.C., and it's been reported by a number of news outlets, that Donald Trump is musing aloud and posing this question to staff, to his friends. What do you think, Vance or Rubio? What's he up to?
Sam, in a way, Donald Trump has made the 2028 Republican presidential nomination part of his crowd routine. He'll sort of say to a crowd, so what do you think? Who should be the nominee? Should it be Vance? And then he'll hear the cheers there. Yes. Or how about Rubio? I think he's just really doing it to sort of play up a bit of attention at this point. It's really quite far out from 2028 and the nominating contest. But on the other hand, you know, what Washington insiders call the invisible primary is already underway in both Republican and Democratic parties. And you're starting to see some signs that different people are maybe jockeying for support for the nomination.
As you say, yes. He was posing this question initially, I think, behind closed doors, but then he turned up this week, of course, in the Rose Garden and just put it to everyone at a public function.
Who's it going to be? Is it going to be JD? Is it going to be somebody else? I don't know. Does anybody have... OK, let's go. You ready? Who likes JD Vance? Who likes Marco Rubio? All right. That was a perfect ticket. That does not mean you have my endorsement under any circumstances.
Is he suggesting here that these two men should run together on the same ticket or is he pitting them against each other? What do you think?
You know, he's suggested that Vance and Rubio do run on the same ticket. Sometimes he'll say Rubio-Vance, sometimes he'll say Vance-Rubio. But the reality is I don't think he or anyone else is committed to either of these potential candidates at this point. For one thing, I think Donald Trump still, in his heart of hearts, harbours a desire that he could himself be the nominee.
All right. Well, let's consider J.D. Vance for now, and then we'll come to Marco Rubio. In July 2024, of course, Donald Trump announced that J.D. Vance would be his running mate in the election that was held later in the year. That was a huge moment, of course, for Vance. And it did set him up, didn't it, to be the next presidential nominee. So just remind me of that initial relationship between the two men.
So J.D. Vance has had one of the more meteoric rises in American politics in recent decades. I remember meeting him for the first time back around 2016, and he considered Donald Trump to be cultural poison akin to heroin. He was an OG never-Trumper back then. But, of course, he saw which way the political winds were blowing. He made sure to reinvent himself as Donald Trump's biggest fan. That got him the Donald Trump nod that allowed him to rise through the primaries in the Ohio Senate race and allowed him to get elected.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–0:34
2
What roles is Marco Rubio currently holding in Trump's administration?
0:34–6:15
3
What speculation surrounds Marco Rubio's potential presidential candidacy?
6:15–8:03
4
How is Donald Trump using the question of 'Vance or Rubio' in public?
8:03–11:52
5
What are the implications of Trump's 'invisible primary' for Republican candidates?
11:52–16:18