Those keen to wrest control of the GOP from MAGA conservatives and to resume the course charted by the party prior to President Donald Trump’s 2016 election have their work cut out for them.
A new poll conducted by the Saint Anselm College Survey Center at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics revealed that Vice President JD Vance presently towers over his potential 2028 GOP primary opponents — including Calgary-born Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who is poised to run as the kind of George W. Bush-era Republican that Trump crushed in the 2016 and 2024 primaries.
‘Voters will sniff out anybody who has seemed to be sort of focused on themselves.’
When asked whom they would vote for if the election were held this month, 57% of respondents said that they would support Vance; 9% said Secretary of State Marco Rubio; 7% said Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis; 4% said Ohio gubernatorial candidate Vivek Ramaswamy; 4% said former U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nimarata “Nikki” Haley; 4% said Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard; 1% said Ted Cruz; and 1% said Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin.
Two percent of respondents signaled they would vote for someone else, and 10% said they were unsure.
Sources close to the Trump administration recently told Politico that Rubio has telegraphed that he would support Vance if he chooses to run.
One source close to the White House noted that the “expectation is JD as [nominee] and Rubio as VP.”
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DeSantis, who secured less than 2% of the votes cast in the 2024 Republican primary before dropping out, recently told CNN’s Jake Tapper, “I’m not thinking about anything because I think we have a president now who’s not even been in for a year. We’ve got a lot that we’ve got to accomplish.”
The Florida governor may have taken the advice that James Blair, a former DeSantis staffer who now serves as Trump’s White House deputy chief of staff, recently shared via Politico: “If you’re a Republican that wants to run in 2028 right now, you need to focus on keeping Republicans in power for 2026. I think the number one thing everybody can do is focus on the team and helping their team and not focus on themselves.”
“Voters will sniff out anybody who has seemed to be sort of focused on themselves,” added Blair.
Last month, the University of New Hampshire’s Granite State Poll found that while DeSantis didn’t place in the top five Republican presidential primary candidates for 2028, he managed the fourth-highest favorability rating.
Vance placed first with a favorability rating among likely Republican primary voters of 77%; Rubio placed second with a 58% rating; Gabbard placed third with a 57% rating; DeSantis came fourth with a 56% rating; and Ramaswamy came fifth with 46%.
Cruz and Haley, meanwhile, were much further down the list with favorability ratings of 38% and 25%, respectively.
Gabbard, polling ahead of Cruz in the Saint Anselm College poll, has not made explicit any intention to run but indicated earlier this year on “The Megyn Kelly Show” that she “will never rule out any opportunity” to serve her country.
On the prediction website Polymarket, Vance is given a 55% chance of winning the primary.
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