Republicans turn on each other as Trump's promises are dead

David Pakman (0:00)

Today, we're looking ahead to 2028 And believe it or not, the prediction markets and polls are pointing towards JD Vance versus Jon Ossoff in the general election. Could it actually happen? And would you like that? Meanwhile, Republicans are turning on each other after the midterm disaster. Senator John Kennedy, the Republican, calling fellow Republicans stupid and offering some weird advice about peeing on your hands. We're also going to look at why owning the libs stops being so entertaining when people can't afford their groceries. Plus the measles outbreak is exploding. Thousands of infections, a hundred million dollars in costs over the last two years. And Democrats may have surprising opportunity to effectively end the Electoral College before twenty twenty eight. And Donald Trump facing growing questions about what did he know with regard to this Chinese spy connected to Nvidia's former CEO as of about twenty four hours ago. And when did he know it? Plus your emails, comments and feedback, all of it and more starting right now. Why not?

What if the twenty twenty eight presidential election comes down to JD Vance versus John Ossoff? JD Vance, of course, would be the Republican nominee and Jon Ossoff would be the Democratic nominee. Now, why do I bring this up? I know we just finished the midterms. The presidential election is basically two years away. And historically, when you look two years out, the likely nominees that far in advance usually don't end up being the nominees. So I'm saying that up front. But something interesting is happening right now. JD Vance leads the Republican nomination betting markets and Jon Ossoff leads the Democratic markets. And over the weekend, I was at Crooked Con in Washington, DC., where they did a straw poll of attendees and Jon Ossoff won the 20 28 Democratic presidential straw poll as well with 30 something percent of the vote. Now, that's a progressive political conference. It's not a representative sample of the Democratic Party electorate. It just gives us an idea of, you know, where is there some enthusiasm? Ossoff just won reelection in Georgia by a massive margin. That's a state Trump carried in twenty twenty four. So for today, let's imagine this matchup, Vance versus Ossoff. Now, on the Republican side, JD. Vance would try.

Don't know if he'll be able to, but he will try to inherit Donald Trump's coalition. So it'll be like the MAGA base, the populist, right? The people who want Trump ism to continue after Trump, maybe pull in like the kind of Tucker Carlson type people. But JD. Vance is not Donald Trump. And whatever you think of Trump and I don't think much of him, he does have a sort of charisma that includes an ability to kind of connect with supporters that wouldn't necessarily transfer to JD. Vance. And in fact, JD. Vance is one of the least charismatic people in the national political space that I can think of. He's awkward and he's stiff and he's uncomfortable in situations where you're kind of just supposed to be spontaneous. We've seen it again and again, the doughnut incident and all of it. There's also no guarantee that Republicans would even nominate him because you've got Marco Rubio who could make a run. You've got Ron DeSantis. You've got others that could make an argument. We need a different direction. We need something less directly attached to MAGA. And Rubio, if he does resign secretary of state soon, would maybe be doing it to argue, I am taking distance from Trumpism. I am not part of that movement. Now, there could also be some pretty major disagreements in the Republican primary about foreign policy, including the Iran war, what the priorities should be on immigration, economic policy, how closely Republicans should remain tied to Trump. So they're going to have some stuff to figure out on the Republican side. That's on the Vance side. Now, let's look at the Democratic side. Jon Ossoff is a very interesting candidate. I think he's excellent. He's young. He's from Georgia. He has an ability to win competitive states. He is increasingly aggressive in his confrontation of the Trump administration. Let me give you that the downside to Ossoff that I'm hearing I've over the last three to four months, I've met casually sort of coincidentally a bunch of big Democratic donors who have spent time with Ossoff and they universally tell me the same thing, which is Ossoff is really good at the prepared speeches that they film with three cameras, with the soft blurred out background and the dramatic lighting and like he's really, really good at that stuff.

But when they've been with Ossoff in smaller rooms, they all tell me the same thing, which is he's really socially awkward. He struggles to connect one on one with people and he is so compelling on stage, but in person he struggles. They a couple also said he just seems really young in person, even though he has a sort of different presentation in these speeches that in person, you're like, man, this guy feels really young and inexperienced. These are not my claims. I've never met him in person. I'm just kind of the messenger for what people have told me. Now you could argue the in person doesn't really matter because most of the campaign is through speeches and TV appearances. So maybe it doesn't make a difference. That may be the case. I think Ossoff is great. Now, this is their assessment, but it's interesting because presidential campaigns involve a lot different kinds of interactions. And even though you might be working to convince voters mostly through the TV screen or the phone or whatever, the small gatherings and the donor meetings and some of the unscripted conversations and retail politics still do matter, at least to some degree. Now, if your opponent is JD Vance, who has one of the biggest charisma problems I've ever seen, it might not really matter, even if these folks are right about Ossoff. But Democrats also have other possibilities. You could see AOC if she runs. I don't think she will. But if she runs, she might consolidate the progressive left. You could see other candidates who would be more in the Ossoff wing politically competing for the same voters. So it would be like Newsome or Josh Shapiro, JB. Pritzker, Wes Moore. They would all be in the sort of similar area politically as Ossoff. And they are really good in person. Like I've been in person with all of those people and they do connect really well with individuals. So that's something to consider. Now, a lot of the people we're talking about have said they're not running. Ossoff has said he's not running in twenty twenty eight. People are still speculating. Wes Moore has said he's not running in twenty twenty eight. There's a lot of speculation that he will. And what's interesting about this hypothetical is that both parties would be confronting pretty similar questions. Do we want a candidate that signals ideological continuity or do we want a candidate that signals ideological change? Do we want to give priority to those who have experience governing or to communication skills or to somebody that can be more uniting to different factions? What do we want? And the other thing we that is an it's not knowable right now is that we're kind of talking about this in today's political environment. But the political environment might be very different by the end of twenty twenty seven or into twenty twenty eight. So I am not predicting Vance versus Ossoff. I'm merely saying right now they're leading the prediction markets and some of the polling straw polling in some cases, etc.