- Rubio has not closed the door on running in 2028.
- Vance says he will talk to Trump about the possibility of running.
- Trump calls both Vance, Rubio very high intelligence.
President Donald Trump on Wednesday declined to take sides in the debate over whether his Vice President, JD Vance, or his Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, would most likely be his successor in the 2028 Republican presidential campaign.
Vance, a former Republican senator from Ohio, has said he will talk to Trump about the possibility of running after the midterm elections in November.
There is also speculation among Republican insiders that Rubio, a former senator from Florida who ran for the GOP presidential nomination in 2016 and lost to Trump, could seek the presidency.
Rubio has not closed the door on running in 2028, but has praised Vance as a strong potential candidate.
Trump said he would “be inclined” to support a successor when asked about Vance and Rubio during an interview with NBC Newsbut added that he did not wish to enter upon the subject now.
“We’ve got three years left. I don’t want to, you know, I’ve got two people who are doing a great job. I don’t want to argue with, or I don’t want to use the word ‘fight’ — it wouldn’t be a fight. But look, JD’s great and Marco’s great,” Trump said.
Trump has often said that the two men should ride together on the same ticket. The 2028 election will feature a wide-open race on both the Republican and Democratic sides, and crowded fields are expected.
In a possible nod to Rubio, the nation’s chief diplomat, Trump said of the pair: “I would say one is a little more diplomatic than the other.”
He called them both men of very high intelligence.
“I think there’s a difference in style,” Trump said. “You know, you can see the style yourself. But they’re both very capable. I think this: The combination of JD and Marco would be very hard to beat, I think. But you never know in politics, right?”
Trump in the interview also seemed to again toy with the possibility of seeking an unconstitutional third term. He had flirted with the idea last year and later abandoned the concept.
Asked if he saw “any scenario” where he would still be president when the next president’s term begins in January 2029, Trump said: “I don’t know. That would be interesting.”
