There might be three years left in Donald Trump’s presidency, but people in the MAGA movement are already thinking about what will happen to the movement and the Republican Party once Trump is gone.
This weekend, at Turning Point USA’s convention, Erika Kirk, the widow of Charlie, announced that she is endorsing Vice President JD Vance for president in 2028. That would seem to preclude the continuing fantasy that Trump could make a push to secure an unconstitutional third term. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who ran for president in 2016 and has been rumored to want to run again, said in an interview last week that he wouldn’t run again if Vance runs.
But even with that endorsement, the GOP is likely looking at a contested presidential primary in 2028. And one Republican senator has now made it clear that he’s not ready to coronate Vance.
Per Mediate, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) appeared on ABC’s This Week on Sunday. When asked by host Jonathan Karl about Vance, Paul seemed to dismiss the idea of backing him, without mentioning his name.
When asked by @JonKarl about a potential 2028 presidential bid for JD Vance, Sen. Rand Paul says: “I’m going to continue to try to lead a conservative free market wing of the party, and we’ll see where things lead over time.”@JonKarl: “And that’s not JD Vance.”
Sen. Paul: “No.” pic.twitter.com/MLEuattWiZ— This Week (@ThisWeekABC) December 21, 2025
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“I think there needs to be representatives in the Republican Party who still believe international trade is good, who still believe in free market capitalism, who still believe in low taxes,” Paul said on the show. “See, it used to separate conservatives and liberals that conservatives thought it was a spending problem; we didn’t want less revenue, we wanted less spending. But now all these pro-tariff protectionists, they love taxes. And so they tax, tax, tax, and then they brag about all the revenue coming in. That has never been a conservative position. So I’m going to continue to try to lead a conservative free market wing in the party, and we’ll see where things lead over time.”
When Karl asked Paul, “That’s not JD Vance,” the senator replied, “no.”
Could Paul run for president himself in 2018? In an interview earlier this fall, he didn’t rule it out.
“I think the Republican Party needs to have a voice that’s for trade. I think international trade makes us rich as a country and rich as a people, and we’re losing those voices in the Republican Party,” Paul told Spectrum News in September. “So whether it’s running for president or just being a national voice, I do want to be that voice who says we want low taxes. That means tariffs, which are a tax. We don’t want high tariffs; we want low tariffs. We want more trade.”
Paul ran for president in 2016, but gained little traction.
Photo courtesy of the Political Tribune media library.
