President Donald Trump dances on stage during a rally at Pinnacle Bank Expo Center in Grand Island, Nebraska, on October 5, 2026. REUTERS/Nathan Howard
The GOP's 2028 presidential hopefuls are scrambling to recalibrate their plans after the party suffered a historic wipeout in the midterms, and as the political experts at Pod Save America explained, one of the top contenders' approaches to distancing himself from Trump is by far the stupidest.
In the latest episode of their podcast, filmed live in Washington, D.C., the former Obama administration staffers and liberal pundits of Pod Save America celebrated the Democratic Party's massive electoral gains and examined what they mean for the future. At one point, the conversation turned to the reactions from top Republicans who are expected to run for president in 2028, including Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and outgoing Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, each of whom has formulated their own theories about what hurt the GOP the most with voters.
One of the reactions that drew the most ire from the hosts came from Vice President JD Vance, who pinned the blame for the GOP's losses squarely on the Iran war and claimed that his own personal data experts singled out four things that polling showed were the most important factors for voters: "1) End the [Iran] war; 2) Focus on cost of living/inflation; 3) Put America First; 4) Change our relationship to Israel.”
At one point during the conversation, co-host Dan Pfeiffer, a polling expert and former senior communications advisor for Barack Obama, took an aside to unleash scorn on Vance's gambit to try to become president in 2028, highlighting his terrible track record for actually winning elections on his own, specifically citing his 2022 campaign for the Senate in Ohio.
"JD Vance's strategy for running for president is so f——g stupid, right?" Pfeiffer said. "JD Vance has run for office once in his life. He underperformed every single other Republican on the ballot in Ohio [in 2022] at the time, and he thinks he's going to pull off some trick where he serves as Trump's vice president but also separates himself. It's like watching an elephant walk on a tightrope. Like, what are we doing?"
He added further: "It's just like there is only one way in which JD Vance can become the Republican nominee. It is, 'Donald Trump picks him.' That is the only way. And the only way he can become president is, Donald Trump picks him and he gets lucky and Democrats nominate the wrong person."
Co-host and former Obama speechwriter Jon Lovett grimly joked about there being another way for Vance to become president, alluding to the possibility that Trump may die before the end of his current term.
Co-host and former National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor also noted that Vance's claim that Israel was a top four issue for voters did not pass the smell test and was a poor attempt to pander to anti-Israel conservatives who already hate him.
"There's absolutely no way that the number four issue from the smartest data scientists he knew was Israel. Like we've all seen the same data. It was like 15 on the list," Vietor said. "Obviously, it's wrapped up in the Iran war and inflation and cost of living. But this is JD Vance trying to play to the Tucker Carlson audience, to the Nick Fuentes audience, the kind of 'groyper' far-right. And those people hate him. They hate him. And that is not ever going to change. They hate him because of his identity. They hate him because of his ties to Peter Thiel and the fact that Peter Thiel basically created him in a little [venture capitalist] lab and then birthed him onto all of us. Like, it's not happening."