Speculation as to Trump’s 2024 is in full swing, and Sean Trende has an entry in the genre that’s half obvious and half “What are you smoking?”
10. Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley.
No way in hell. There’s a palpable lack of enthusiasm for Haley among the GOP base, and her primary backers are a tiny cadre of bitter NeverTrumpers. Trump will win South Carolina going away, and the only people likely to back Trump who wouldn’t otherwise would be those Haley campaign staffers hired on for the big show.
9. Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
Maybe. A safe choice and part of a play to bring middle and upper class white women back into the GOP fold. But not much wow factor, and Arkansas is another state Trump will win running away.
8. Sen. J.D. Vance, Ohio.
Vance won his senate race, but he didn’t knock it out of the park. Trump won Ohio in 2020 so there’s no reason to think he won’t win it this time around. Don’t see it.
2. Former Hawai’i Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard.
A good bit more exciting than Haley, and maybe it would play well with young voters, but a pretty long shot. Would give Democrats a bit of the vapors, but Hawaii is too blue a state for this pick to make it competitive. Plus the last Veep nominee to be successfully elected from the House was John Nance Garner, and he was Speaker of the House (and a very powerful and effective one) and the runner-up to FDR in the 1932 Democratic race, not an obscure back-bencher from the other party with all of one losing Presidential run under her belt.
South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott.
Right now, this would be my odds-on favorite for Trump to select, and is probably the pick that has Democrats most worried. The Democratic Party is already losing black voters to Trump, and another 10% loss thanks to a Scott pick might put Pennsylvania and Michigan beyond the margin of fraud.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott.
This would be a safe pick in the Pence mode, the base won’t object to him (the way they might over, say, Gabbard or Haley), but Texas is another state Trump wins going away.
4. Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds.
If you’re going to pick a white, female governor, Reynolds is a better pick than Haley, Kay Ivey is too old for a ticket balance pick, and Noem has managed to take herself out of the picture (🐕 🔫), but Reynolds is squishy on a wide range of culture war issues, and isn’t even as well-liked as Sanders. And Iowa is another state Trump won handily.
North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum.
Beloved by election wonks but unknown nationally, and another state Trump will win handily. Don’t see it.
2. Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
A credible pick who’s on the right side of the culture wars that would be popular with the base and put Virginia in play. But, by that standard, Lieutenant Governor Winsome Earle-Sears might be an even better pick, with additional appeal to blacks voters. She would be higher on my list than most of Trende’s picks.
1. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.
The irrational enthusiasm for Rubio among certain segments of the punditry remind me of the similar irrational enthusiasm for Jeb!
This meme still cracks me up.
Rubio is an intellectual lightweight who did poorly in the 2016 Presidential race, would make the ticket constitutionally ineligible to receive Florida’s votes (something Trende unconvincingly tap dances around), and I see no signs that Rubio would draw Hispanics to the ticket in places like Nevada and Arizona, despite Trende’s assertions, which seem more like wishcasting than analysis.
Of Trende’s list, Scott, Youngkin, Sanders, and Abbott strike me as credible choices. I’d also add Earle-Sears, Alabama Senator Katie Britt (age/sex balancing the ticket), Rand Paul (libertarian/youth appeal), and former New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez (play for that state), all of which strike me as more likely picks than Rubio.
But Trump has a long history of doing the unexpected…
Tags: 2024 Presidential Race, Donald Trump, Doug Burgum, Glenn Youngkin, Greg Abbott, J. D. Vance, Kim Reynolds, Marco Rubio, Nikki Haley, Rand Paul, Republicans, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, Sean Trende, Tim Scott, Tulsi Gabbard, Vice President, Winsome Sears
I don’t think Winsome Sears is eligible to be president. Isn’t she a naturalized citizen born in Jamaica with Jamaican parents?
No Vivek?
Lee Zeldin
“Rand Paul (libertarian/youth appeal)” would get the same reception as Goldwater did in 1964. This is not to say that he would not be my preferred choice but the American public is not ready for a Peace and Freedom candidate. I suspect the economy would have to collapse before the necessary changes could be made.
[…] enter U.S. illegally at southern border, but rafters get sent back to Cuba immediately BattleSwarm: The Veepstakes Silly Season Behind The Black: SpaceX launches more Starlink satellites, SpaceX to FAA: Let us launch […]
Yes, Winsome Sears is ineligible. Too bad–I like her, too.
Katie Britt strikes me as a squish and trough feeder who trained at the feet of a master trough feeder Richard Shelby.
“Tulsi has softened her stance on several issues”
I keep hearing this. No. Hell no. Nope. A person does not have views for multiple decades only to change them in the last 12 months and not act upon those deep-seated beliefs. Tulsi is anti-2A through and through, which is an absolute dealbreaker, no matter how easy she is on the Mk1 eyeballs.
Still have my fingers crossed for an announcement that Trump wants a VP who posts stupid jokes in blog comments under a pseudonym…
I cant stand Trende; he was a big clot shot proponent and called non-vaxxers evil and selfish.
Anyway, I think Vivek has to be in the mix and assuming he’s not a plant, has the youth Trump lacks and matches his energy. But it’s a longshot.
Scott is black but is low energy and dull. I don’t get any excitement from him. I’d love Rand to be there as the next President but not sure we’re ready as you say.
Dark horse Presidential candidate in a few cycles: Michael Saylor
The advantage (to Texas) of Greg Abbott becoming the VP pick is that when Trump wins Dan Patrick replaces Abbott as governor. Should make the 2025 session fun.
Back in March Abbott said he does not want to be VP, he wants to run for governor again.
Sure he could change his mind if actually offered the job, but I don’t think he will, and I don’t he is really a candidate. Good guy, but Trump needs someone different.
Vivek would be a great Press Secretary.
Yeah, like Vivek wants to be Press Secretary. He’ll want something higher in stature to put him back in the mix for 2028, and I’m all for him being Veep or SecTreas.
If Trump is going to pick someone from Florida, he should pick DeSantis.
If Trump wins in 2024, then his VP will be the GOP nominee in 2028. And I’d much rather that be DeSantis than anyone else
“Donald Trump has always liked a tall man [Cotton is 6’5”] with a memorable last name, so it can come as no surprise that he’s interested in Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton as a possible running mate.”
This droll but dismissive analysis is intriguing. A Trump/Cotton ticket offers a balanced North/South approach to the Electoral College. Trump lives in Florida but his heart is in NYC whereas Cotton is deeply conservative.
https://arktimes.com/arkansas-blog/2024/05/24/tom-cotton-reportedly-a-leading-contender-for-donald-trumps-running-mate
I could readily endorse this pairing.
Rubio “would make the ticket constitutionally ineligible to receive Florida’s votes”
What? Why?
Article II, Section 1, Clause 3 of the Constitution of the United States of America: “The Electors shall meet in their respective States, and vote by Ballot for two Persons, of whom one at least shall not be an Inhabitant of the same State with themselves.”
Final analysis? Does it really matter?
In my more depressive moments, I have to acknowledge that we’ve gone so far down the rabbit hole of deep state corruption that it’s about like what happened to Sarah Palin: Whoever Trump picks, they’re going to destroy.
We’d be a much different country if Palin hadn’t been deliberately destroyed by the RINO faction. She should have told McCain “Well, that’s awfully nice of you, but I’m busy here in Alaska and can’t join your losing campaign to turn the election over to Obama…”
I watched a bunch of her stuff that never made mainstream news, including a speech she gave in Hong Kong back right after she burned in with McCain; the woman was not what the media advertised her as… Smart, well-spoken, and with a much better grasp on policy than nine-tenths of the dolts we get put up in front of us.
We badly need to eliminate the professional political class from top to bottom. You cannot have a mass of unelected career bottom-feeders serving as Congressional staff that have no ties to the home district, and that’s just exactly what we have. They write most of the legislation, do all the work, and the Senator or Representative is just their catspaw figurehead.
Tulsi and Rubio are the Deep State dream team. Neither should be in the same zip code as Trump when he’s President.
Governor Huckabee Sanders is a great choice. Has faced White House press, is a governor, has no zipper issues, and can be our first female President 4 years later. No one else presents that eventuality.
@kaempi
I agree that Rubio is not the best choice, and the optics of having both members of the ticket from the same state are not good.
However, to answer your question, prior to the adoption of the 12th Amendment, presidential electors voted only for a presidential candidate. Whoever got the most votes got to be president. Whoever got the second most votes got to be vice president (provided they got a majority and the contest wasn’t sent to the House).
The 12th Amendment provided for separate elections for president and vice-president, so the electors had to choose for both. It also required that one of the two must not be a resident of their own state. What that means is that if a Trump/Rubio ticket carried Florida, then Florida’s electors, and ONLY Florida’s electors could not vote for both of them. Contrary to the misinformation commonly believed, there is no prohibition of both candidates coming from the same state.
What does this mean: “… the last Veep nominee to be successfully elected was John Nance Garner …”?
There seem to be a bunch of words or qualifications missing from that sentence. A vice presidential nominee always gets elected in every presidential election.
@370H55V: You are correct about the 12th amendment and the Florida electors not being able to vote for both Trump and Rubio. That said, I don’t think that Trump is guaranteed to win the Electoral College by such a big margin that he could afford to have his running mate fall short of an electoral college majority (which would turn the VP choice over to the Senate).
Practically speaking, if Trump wanted to select a Florida-based running mate like Rubio, Trump himself would have to move to another state; as a U.S. senator from Florida, Rubio can’t be expected to move out of state. But I think the Republican VP nominee will be a non-Floridian.
Somehow the editing process ate the “from the House” qualifier, now restored.
I see that the words missing were “from the House.”
Its silly to play the old “VP needs to carry a state” game.
1) If Trump wins and is allowed to take office, it will be bc he won by such an overwhelming margin they could steal the election with conventional tricks. 8-10 states (and their biggest cities like Milwaukee, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Atlanta, Detroit, etc) will decide the election
2) Trump’s goal should be literally to STAY ALIVE. If he takes office, the DS will be sorely tempted to JFK him. TRump only gets the chance to complete his term if the DS is even more terrified of his VP. Rand Paul would be a great choice as VP. RFK wouldn’t be terrible.
An RFK pick and deal would insure hilarity and mayhem follow!