Trump is playing his would-be successors like fiddles: NYT analysis

Donald Trump with secretary of state Marco Rubio, defense secretary Pete Hegseth and commerce secretary Howard Lutnick at a cabinet meeting on 9 October 2025. Photograph: Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters

President Donald Trump is reportedly cultivating tension between two of his top officials, Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, as he tantalizes each with the prospect of being the Republican nominee in 2028.

“Every now and then, while talking to officials in the Oval Office, with friends over dinner, or on the patio at Mar a Lago, President Trump pauses and muses aloud about a subject quietly captivating the Republican Party,” The New York Times reported on Sunday. “What do you think? JD or Marco?”

The Times cited multiple sources close to Trump as saying the president frequently asks advisers if they would prefer either Vance or Rubio to succeed him. After receiving their various responses, he will then reportedly speculate that Vance and Rubio should run together in 2028.

“Mr. Trump’s advisers say he is simply having fun polling people, and that 2028 is not at the top of his mind at all,” the Times added. “Still, it would be hard for Mr. Trump to ignore that lately, the two men he refers to as ‘kids’ are taking on bigger profiles as the midterm elections approach.”

The Times added that both public polls and anecdotal evidence suggests that between Vance and Rubio, Vance would have the clear edge. In addition to being far more popular among primary voters than Rubio, Vance has even received an indirect endorsement from the Secretary of State himself. Speaking to Vanity Fair last year, Rubio said that “if JD Vance runs for president, he’s going to be our nominee, and I’ll be one of the first people to support him.”

“He is unpopular, with an approval rating sitting at 35 percent in the most recent Washington Post/ABC News/Ipsos poll,” the Times reported. “But according to a Pew survey taken earlier this year, Mr. Vance is a far more recognizable figure to American voters than most other Trump administration figures — only Mr. Trump and Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the Health and Human Services secretary, are better known.”

The newspaper added, “According to Pew, 75 percent of Republican voters have favorable views of Mr. Vance, compared with 64 percent who have favorable views of Mr. Rubio. And 19 percent of Republican voters have never heard of the secretary of state.”

Reports of Trump playing Vance against Rubio precede the recent Times report. In March Trump reportedly played a “game” with the two men about who would follow him in power.

“The 2028 election is more than 2½ years away, but it is very much on Trump’s mind, as he casts about for a suitable heir to his MAGA empire,” The Wall Street Journal wrote at the time. “For months, the president has privately polled advisers, donors and friends about the political strengths and weaknesses of his vice president and secretary of state, pitting the two young, ambitious Republicans against each other—whether they like it or not.”

The Journal continued, “Less than a day after the U.S. began bombing Iran, President Trump met with two dozen donors at his Mar-a-Lago club. As attendees dined on jumbo crab and rib-eye steaks, Trump asked the crowd: What do you think of JD Vance and Marco Rubio? The guests applauded louder for Rubio, according to people in the room.”

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