Does Alastair Campbell think JD Vance or Marco Rubio can win the presidency in 2028?

Alastair Campbell said both are finished unless they separate themselves from the Trump agenda. He wondered whether JD Vance will even run, calling him intelligent but lacking the appeal that lets Trump hold a crowd through 90-minute unscripted rambles. He thought Marco Rubio could just about get there because he has kept more of an independent voice, though Campbell believes Rubio sold his soul. He would prefer a new Republican figure to emerge, and suspects Trump himself wants the party to struggle after him.

• Alastair Campbell credited Vance as the only Republican who grasped what King Charles's speech to Congress was really saying.
• Rory Stewart framed the 2028 Republican puzzle as three problems: handling Trump, the economy and AI.

▸In their words

“If J.D. Vance shot somebody in Fifth Avenue, he'd go to jail” Alastair Campbell · at 1:04:00 — open in the transcript →

Source: our own transcription of the episode. The full conversation is on The Rest Is Politics (2026-11-04). Read the whole episode summary →

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