US President Donald Trump makes a lot of jokes — often at other people’s expense.
But rarely does he openly mock his own vice-president, and by doing so recently, he has unleashed a new wave of speculation about who he will anoint as his successor as the 2028 presidential election approaches.
An increasingly popular talking point among Americans is whether Vice-President JD Vance or Secretary of State Marco Rubio will receive Trump’s blessing for the nomination.
Despite his various political problems at the moment — the biggest being the search for a permanent end to the war in Iran and reopening of the Strait of Hormuz — Trump still has huge influence inside the Republican Party.
That has been shown during the Republican Party’s primary elections in recent weeks, in which almost all of the candidates backed by Trump have won.
The most recent joke came when Trump was asked about sending Vance to Switzerland to try to resolve the most complicated problem of this second Trump term, the war in Iran.
Vance is widely reported to have opposed the US decision to go to war against Iran.
So Trump’s decision to appoint him to work out a long-term deal with Iranian negotiators put him in a tricky situation: trying to end a war he didn’t want in the first place.
As vice-president, JD Vance is widely seen as the most likely choice to succeed Donald Trump as the party’s presidential candidate. (Reuters: Evelyn Hockstein)
With that context well understood by Americans, Trump joked that dispatching Vance meant he, as president, would be a winner whatever the outcome.
“This way, if it works out, I’m going to take the credit,” Trump quipped.
“If it doesn’t work out, I’m blaming JD. You better be careful, JD.“
As with so many things Trump says, there’s plausible deniability. These are jokes, the White House often says afterwards.
But the thing about Trump jokes is that they often contain a hard edge of reality.
“JD Vance is in an excruciatingly difficult spot,” says presidential historian Matthew Dallek.
“He reportedly was opposed to the war, the only senior administration official to oppose it. But now he’s stuck with the war because he’s Trump’s vice-president.
“And the problem he has, like all vice-presidents, is that you don’t get to wave goodbye to a president’s policies. You represent the administration; you are a spokesperson for the administration.
“So there is no world in which JD Vance can suddenly say, ‘Oh, I was opposed to a policy before I was for it’, right?”
Harking back to The Apprentice
One reason there’s increasing speculation about who Trump will anoint as his successor is that, at the same time as he jokes about Vance, he frequently gives glowing reviews of the diplomatic work of Rubio.
Trump himself appears to be revelling in the competition, recently asking a crowd to whom he was speaking: “Who’s it gonna be? Is it gonna be JD, is it gonna be somebody else? I don’t know.”
Warming up to the subject, Trump asked the audience:
“Who likes JD Vance? Who likes Marco Rubio? Alright, sounds like a good ticket.“
Perhaps there’s the reality — that Trump might endorse the two on a joint Vance-Rubio ticket. But, of course, there will still be the issue of who tops that ticket.
Donald Trump has a history of pitting ambitious people against one other as a reality TV host. (AP)
At times, it looks like Trump is harking back to his days hosting the television show The Apprentice — a point not lost on the vice-president, who is finding himself frequently trying to play down questions of whether Trump will anoint him or Rubio.
“I just don’t think it sounds like the president of the United States to have a televised competition for who would succeed him as his apprentice,” Vance said at a press conference last month.
As to the two men in the spotlight, they appear to be doing their best — publicly at least — not to buy into any drama if indeed their boss does want the world’s highest-profile hunger games.
“I love Marco,” Vance said. “I think he’s a great secretary of state. He’s become a very, very dear friend.“
And Rubio is reciprocating the goodwill. “JD is a very good friend of mine,” he told NBC News. “If JD runs for president, I think he’d be a phenomenal candidate.”
Both men have criticised Trump in the past, before being chosen for their current roles.
In 2016, Vance wrote to a friend from university: “I go back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like [Richard] Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he’s America’s Hitler.”
(Vance has since said his past comments about Trump no longer reflect his views.)
Marco Rubio is known to have been more supportive of the Iran war than the vice-president. (Reuters: Jonathan Ernst)
Professor Dallek, from George Washington University, says being deputy to Trump would not be easy.
“Trump has not exactly shown a history of loyalty to people who have worked for him,” he tells the ABC.
“I mean, he’s thrown plenty of people under the bus and JD Vance has had to twist himself into a pretzel when he once said Trump could be America’s Hitler.
“Being vice-president to Trump is extremely difficult, right? I mean, look what happened to his last vice-president [Mike Pence]. He was almost killed on January 6th when then-president Trump said that Mike Pernce needs to save the country and do the right thing.
“And then he didn’t, according to Trump, and the mob stormed the Capitol.”
Professor Dallek says Vance has been “more MAGA” than Rubio over several years, and has identified himself with the more isolationist, anti-immigrant wing of the Republican party.
“I don’t think Trump has any loyalty to a good soldier who is a vice-president.“
The GOP’s ‘800-pound gorilla’
Much can happen, of course, between now and the election in 2028.
Technically, the candidate will be appointed at the Republican National Convention after caucus and primary elections in each state.
But given how Trump has taken control of the Republican Party, his endorsement could decide the candidate — if he still holds that level of influence.
Marco Rubio (left) and JD Vance say they are good friends. (Reuters)
Republican strategist Alex Conant, who worked with Rubio as part of his 2016 presidential campaign, believes Vance retains the advantage given his vice-presidential status.
“I think most people would have to say JD Vance, simply because he’s the vice-president,” he says.
“I can’t think of anybody who would challenge Vice-President Vance at this stage, but it is early, and it’s possible that other, potentially governors or members of the Senate or the House, might also run and try to make it competitive.
“But given the strength of the MAGA movement within the Republican Party and how popular JD Vance is with that, I think he’ll be a very formidable candidate.”
Mr Conant says there are no Republican heavyweights other than Trump at present.
“Trump is the 800-pound gorilla, more than that, in the Republican Party right now,” he says.
“And you see that playing out in Republican primaries across the country right now, where Trump’s hand-picked candidates are winning across the board.
“I think if Trump decides to make a selection, that person will be the nominee. And if he stays neutral, I still think JD Vance is the frontrunner given his popularity within the MAGA movement.”
Marco Rubio’s presidential ambitions were derailed by Donald Trump in 2016. (Reuters: Carlo Allegri)
But is that 800-pound gorilla starting to make mistakes, such as his apocalyptic warning to Iranians that “a whole civilization will die tonight”? Mr Conant replies: “I think Donald Trump is as popular with the Republican Party today as he’s ever been.”
Mr Conant says it’s not surprising that Trump does not want to announce who he’s going to back. That would instantly weaken him, he says.
“I think Donald Trump is enjoying being president himself and is not looking forward to being a lame-duck president.“
He challenges the view that being Trump’s vice-president is difficult.
“There’s only one Donald Trump and I don’t think anybody’s ever going to confuse another politician for being Donald Trump,” Mr Conant says.
“JD Vance has had a very impressive political rise from the Senate to the vice-presidency in very short order. Clearly, he has a lot of supporters inside the MAGA movement, a lot of supporters that are also close to Trump.”
Professor Dallek says beyond who the next candidate will be is the question of the future of the Republican Party.
“It could be someone coming in and saying, ‘I’m truly America first. I don’t want to start wars with Iran,'” he says.
“So there may be an opening for a more non-interventionist or isolationist Republican Party to take hold.”
