President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he and Vice President JD Vance have not discussed a 2028 endorsement, brushing off the succession question with the answer he has given all year: it is early, and the Republican Party has a deep bench.
Vance said much the same from his side this week, admitting he is not sure the endorsement would come even if he runs. "I might be terrible at it," Vance said. "Having never spoken to the president about this, I can't speak to his psychology on it, but my attitude is that if I run, I think the president would endorse me, but I also haven't talked to him about it yet." Asked directly whether Trump would back him, Vance answered: "I would think so, but I don't know, man." He has not decided whether to run at all, and says his focus is helping Republicans in the November midterms.
Trump has kept every option open. He calls Vance "fantastic" and "great," says it is "way too early" to back anyone, and has floated the idea that Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio could form an "unstoppable" ticket — without ever saying which man should lead it. When The Washington Post reported that Trump told donors "we need to elect JD," the president declined to call it an endorsement: "No. I heard about it a little while ago. I think he's great, but we're way too early to even be thinking about that." Vance joked that a televised competition to succeed Trump does not sound like the president at all.
Rubio, for his part, has publicly stepped back for Vance, saying that if Vance runs for president, "he's going to be our nominee, and I'll be one of the first people to support him" — even as Rubio's own standing in the administration keeps rising. At the party's midterm convention in Dallas, grassroots Republicans chanted "JD! 48!" for the vice president.
For now, both men are saying the same thing in public: midterms first, 2028 later.