By any measure, 2028 will be an extraordinary moment, because it will mark the end of only the second non-consecutive two-term presidency in American history.

Tweet

Indiana Republican Sen. Jim Banks has long been an advocate for Vice President JD Vance. Before the 2024 GOP convention, Banks urged President Donald Trump to pick Vance as his running mate. Now Banks says, "After President Trump, [Vance] is the next best thing" and is a lock to be the next Republican nominee for president.

"JD Vance will be the nominee in 2028 – mark my words," Banks told a dinner in Washington last week organized by American Spectator Editor-in-Chief R. Emmett Tyrrell Jr. Banks also predicted Vance will win the 2028 general election if Republicans follow the prescription Banks laid out for lasting GOP success: diminishing the influence of China and reorienting global trade, becoming a pro-worker party, pursuing peace through strength, restoring American manufacturing and replacing wokeism with patriotism.

After Trump finishes his presidency, Vance is the candidate to do that, Banks said. "To give JD Vance a lot of credit, he's not running for president yet," Banks explained. "He's focusing on supporting President Trump. He's heavily involved in negotiations over reconciliation. He's been very effective in working with some of the early detractors on Trump nominees and flipping them from 'no' to 'yes' on some of the more challenging nominees, like Hegseth, RFK Jr. and others. ... He's an effective partner of the president and a good communicator." Vance will use all those skills for his own campaign at some point in the future  but not now.

One intriguing point Banks made was on the question of what is most important to Trump himself. Banks suggested that at this point in his second, nonconsecutive term, Trump has goals higher than securing the next victory for the Republican Party. 

"I know President Trump wants to keep and grow the majorities in the midterms," Banks said. "I know President Trump wants a Republican to replace him. But I think what President Trump wants a lot more than that is to diminish China and give America a better shot for the future for our kids and our grandkids."

It was an extraordinary thought. First, just for his own future, Trump needs Republicans to win the midterms in the House, because if they don't, it is an absolute guarantee that Democrats, once in control, would impeach him. The resulting 24/7 combat would make the last two years of Trump's term depressingly similar to much of his first term. 

In addition, losing the House and/or Senate, for a second-term president, is like a formal declaration of lame-duck status. In the current political atmosphere, if Trump loses the House, that would be pretty much the end of any legislative ambitions. And if he loses the Senate, that would be the end of his judicial nominations, or at least his conservative judicial nominations. So the midterms mean a lot.

And then there is the question of the 2028 succession. By any measure, 2028 will be an extraordinary moment, because it will mark the end of only the second non-consecutive two-term presidency in American history. Voters won't be passing judgment on eight straight years of a Trump presidency. Rather, they will be passing judgment at the end of a wild Trump-Biden-Trump era, deciding which of two very different directions the country will go. 

Nevertheless, half an hour later, Banks returned to the thought. "He wants to win the midterms, he wants a Republican to succeed him," Banks said. "But he cares a lot more about the legacy of all of this, and the diminishment of China and the rise of America, and the books you and others are going to write 20, 30, 40 years from now about how it all worked. I think that means a lot more to him."

Banks is fully on board for Trump's tariffs – a RealClearPolitics profile recently called him "a trade warrior after Trump's own heart." He thinks the United States has the power to prevail – "I believe that China is feeling the pain more than America is feeling the pain," he told the group last week. And even if reorienting trade and embracing the working class do not lead to immediate electoral victories, he believes, it is the most important thing for the Republican Party and, more importantly, for the country.

Byron York is chief political correspondent for The Washington Examiner.

COPYRIGHT 2025 BYRON YORK