For months, the media-industrial complex has produced unnecessary speculation about veepstakes, much of it generated by the aspiring contestants themselves.
Out of nowhere, these stories would pop up: Tom Cotton, an exceptionally strong candidate! Ben Carson! Byron Donalds! Glenn Youngkin! The people you knew, regardless of their qualifications, didn’t really have a chance of becoming Donald Trump racing partner.
And then there was the former president himself, who met or campaigned with most of the candidates, watching their television interviews, in a process akin to “the apprentice.”
A particularly absurd moment came when Axios reported that Nikki Haley was in “active consideration” for VP. The matter collapsed the next day when Trump issued a statement saying that Haley was definitely not being considered, which was unsurprising given the tensions between them and her lack of support.
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The final leg of former President Trump’s veepstakes is underway, and only three serious contenders are left alive to tell the tale: North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance and Sen. Florida Marco Rubio. (Samuel Corum/Getty Images)
What shook most of the stories was that Trump hadn’t made up his mind. Now he says yes, but he didn’t tell the lucky candidate. Of course, nothing stops Trump from changing his mind at the last minute, which he is notoriously prone to doing.
Still, with the verification process underway and several media outlets reporting that it’s a lucky trio, I’m inclined to take these stories more seriously.
These three are Marco Rubio, JD Vance and Doug Burgum.
Everyone brings strengths and weaknesses, so such decisions often come down to who Trump is most comfortable with. Eight years ago it was Mike Pence, who was the ultimate loyalist until January 6.
North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, Ohio Senator JD Vance and Florida Senator Marco Rubio are all vying to become Trump’s running mate for the 2024 presidential election. (Left: Joe Raedle/Getty Images; Center: Luke Sharrett/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Right: Saul Martinez/Getty Images)
Rubio, the only one with a national reputation, may seem like a no-brainer. Appointing the first Hispanic vice president would obviously enthuse this community, even if it is not monolithic and Cuban-Americans would be the most energetic. I don’t see the constitutional ban on two candidates from the same state running as a major problem, because Senator from Florida can easily change their address.
I’ve interviewed Rubio several times, but more importantly, I saw him do town halls in 2016 and he is a charismatic speaker. He has strengths on foreign policy and has long since mended fences with Trump over their mutual insults (“crook”).
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As a strong speaker, he would certainly make news – which is also his trap. Trump doesn’t like to be overshadowed. From day one, whether openly or not, Rubio would run for president in 2028.
Additionally, Rubio insisted not to campaign for this position. He did not join some of the other aspirants in running for Trump’s trial in Manhattan. By some accounts, this has led Trump to question how much Marco wants the job, but I think it’s just a different style.
Third-term Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, one of former President Trump’s main rivals in 2016, is now on his vice presidential shortlist. However, Rubio needs to be careful about how much of Trump’s attention he might try to appropriate for himself. (Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
JD Vance is not a household name and has been a senator for less than two years. He rose to public prominence with his best-selling book “Hillbilly Elegy,” which garnered widespread praise (and some criticism) for explaining the type of white voters who would fuel Trump’s victory. She’s also an achievement, coming from a difficult childhood in which her grandmother had to plead for more food from Meals on Wheels.
But Vance opposed the ex-president in 2016 and was on the “Never Trump” (“stupid,” “reprehensible”) bandwagon, a position he conveniently abandoned when he ran for office .
Vance is undoubtedly the sharpest intellectual of the group, he enjoys the support of Donald Trump Jr. and he has voted the most in favor of the MAGA movement, but his vision of the revolution differs from Trump’s. Two years ago, Vance said in an interview that Trump should “fire all the mid-level civil servants, all the administrative state civil servants and replace them with our people.” This, of course, would violate civil service rules.
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Vance said New York Times Columnist Ross Douthat, who knew him before he became a writer: “I was confronted with the reality that part of the reason anti-Trump conservatives hated Donald Trump was that he represented a threat to a way of doing things in this country that has been very beneficial to them. »
THE Senator from Ohio recently told the Washington Post: “The price you pay for being liked by the establishment is that you don’t say anything interesting.”
And that’s precisely the problem. Vance will say a lot of interesting things, which will attract the boss’s attention.
“Hillbilly Elegy” author and freshman Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, once an ardent opponent of Trump, changed his mind once he ran for federal office and is now a finalist in the veepstakes ‘former president. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Which brings us to Doug Burgum. He’s a governor! It’s been eight years. Yes, the governor of the small state of North Dakota, which Trump would win all three electoral votes anyway, but the former president spent a lot of time with him and really likes him — although Burgum ran against him earlier in the presidential election cycle.
On the one hand, he’s a tycoon who sold his tech company twenty years ago to Microsoft for a billion dollars. On the other hand, he’s charming in an understated way. And Burgum has “the look” — the appearance fit for a vice president — and Trump loves to kiss those who look like they’re centrally cast.
When I interviewed Burgum a few weeks ago, he downplayed his chances and said he had a dozen private-sector ideas he’d like to try rather than jump in. Cabinet position. He skillfully answered problematic questions without missing anything, sometimes with just one clear line.
After witnessing the Alvin Bragg case and reading the media coverage, “I think they were in a different trial than me…The Americans have already acquitted Donald Trump,” he told me.
Yet, as one of my colleagues pointed out, he is just raw enough and new to domestic football to still seem like a real person.
The mild-mannered gentleman can also pack a punch. Burgum told FOX’s Martha MacCallum last week that “under Joe Biden, we live today under a dictatorship where it bypasses Congress on immigration policy; he bypasses Congress to protect our border; he bypasses Congress on student loan forgiveness; he defies the Supreme Court. » This line of attack has resonated ever since.
North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum quickly rose to the top of former President Trump’s vice presidential shortlist after his own unsuccessful bid for the Republican nomination. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
So, through the process of elimination, Burgum creates the least amount of trouble for Trump. He has no plans to run for president in four years, he won’t get much attention from the president, and he has a better chance than I thought when we interviewed.
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This is where I must caution that this reasoned analysis might be flawed. Trump could choose Rubio, for example, or choose someone not on the list of three. He might change his mind at the last minute. How would we know, since we have no way of verifying who he says he has now chosen?
A word on the timing of the announcement: There are many reasons why unveiling a vice presidential candidate at the convention has fallen out of favor, and his name is Dan Quayle. The media went wild over George HW Bush’s choice, questioning everything from the senator’s intelligence to past ethical issues, and it completely disrupted the convention.
When John McCain chose Sarah Palin, Governor of Alaska and Hockey Mom was a resounding success at the convention. Only later, when questioned by Katie Couric and others, was she seen as inexperienced and unprepared.
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So I suspect that Trump will announce his choice just before the Milwaukee Congressletting the story unfold in the spotlight should naturally shift to the candidate.
But then again, with Donald Trump, anything is possible.
