Secretary of State Marco Rubio has ruled out running for president in 2028 if Vice President JD Vance seeks the Republican nomination — a significant development in the race to succeed President Donald Trump.
“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,” Rubio told Vanity Fair on Tuesday.
Rubio, 54, and Vance, 41, were widely viewed as the top two potential contenders to succeed term-limited President Trump on the Republican side.
Rubio’s move effectively clears the path for Vance to become the clear 2028 Republican nominee.
Rubio had been privately been telling confidants for months that Vance is the frontrunner for the 2028 Republican nomination.
“Marco has been very clear that JD is going to be the Republican nominee if he wants to be. And that he will do anything he can just to support the vice president in that effort,” Politico reported in November.
In a July interview with Fox News host Lara Trump, the president’s daughter-in-law, Rubio praised Vance as a potential nominee.
“I think JD Vance would be a great nominee … if he decides he wants to do that,” Rubio said. “I think he’s doing a great job as vice president. He’s a close friend, and I hope he intends to do it.”
Rubio said his focus is on serving as secretary of state through the end of Trump’s term.
“I want to do this job, as long as the president allows me to do it, and stay in that job, which would keep me here all the way through January of 2028,” Rubio said. “I believe that if I am able to be here through the duration of this presidency — and we get things done at the pace that we’ve been doing the last six months — I’ll be able to look back at my time in public service and say, ‘I made a difference, I had an impact, and I served my country in a very positive way.'”
Rubio, who ran for president in 2016, did not completely shut the door to a future White House bid.
“You never know what the future holds. You never rule things out or anything, because you just don’t know. Things change very quickly,” he said.
Vance has repeatedly downplayed 2028 speculation, and recently told Fox News host Sean Hannity that neither he nor Rubio are entitled to the presidency.
“If either of us end up running, it’s a long ways in the future, and neither of us is entitled to it. So I think it would be ridiculous for me to say Marco is a rival. No, Marco is a colleague,” Vance said.
“Marco is my best friend in the administration. He and I work a lot together and we really do, I think — a lot of the good work that we do as an administration is because we’re all able to work together,” Vance said in a different interview.
In May, Vance told NBC News that he talks to Rubio five times a day.
“That’s the level of trust and confidence that I have in Marco,” the vice president said.
Trump has publicly floated the idea of Vance and Rubio teaming up on a 2028 ticket, though he did not specify who would be president and who would be vice president.
“We have JD obviously, the vice president, who’s great,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One. “Marco’s great. I’m not sure if anyone would run against those two. I think if they ever formed a group it would be unstoppable.”