Welcome to Monday’s Washington Secrets, where we are recovering from yet another glorious weekend of soccer. Today, we have exclusive polling results that will cheer the vice president’s team as they wonder how to make their man appeal to the sort of ordinary voters who don’t spend their days glued to Fox News and Truth Social…
JD Vance’s position as front-runner for the 2028 Republican nomination has come under pressure in recent months from Marco Rubio.
But he holds a clear lead in one crucial aspect: Republican voters would much rather have a beer with the vice president than any other figure being talked about as a possible nominee.
Some 24% said they most wanted to have a drink with Vance when asked by polling firm JL Partners. Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, ranked second with 15%.
Rubio came third with 13%. Maybe respondents worried they might have to talk about the latest geopolitical developments in Venezuela or the situation in Cuba if they sit down with the Secretary of State.
The results, shared exclusively with Secrets, will be welcome news to Vance’s camp. It helps answer a key question: Is Trump’s hard-charging lieutenant likable enough to take on the top job when the president’s term ends in 2029?
The beer test measures personality and relatability, according to Caroline Mulvaney, research manager at JL Partners.
“You can think someone is a little weird, but still find them relatable, and I think this is very much the case for Vance among Republicans,” she said. “He might not have the strong personality of Trump, but his Hillbilly Elegy branding has really given him a relatability and down-to-earth air that harkens back to George W. (the ultimate president voters would like to have a beer with).”
Rubio’s role naturally distances him from voters with its foreign travel and summits, Mulvaney added, improving his political qualifications but at the expense of his relatability.
Vance is known for enjoying a Miller Lite. And during the 2024 campaign, he stopped off at the City Brewery in La Crosse, Wisconsin, to pick up a six-pack.
The vice president retains an overall lead in the race for the Republican 2028 nomination. Prediction site Kashi gives him a 42% chance of winning, with Rubio in second place at 29%.
The beer test gained prominence in 2000, when voters said they would much rather have a beer with folksy George W. Bush than his rather stiff opponent, Al Gore.
To test the question this time, JL Partners polled 1,000 registered voters for their views.
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) came fourth among Republican voters with 7%, Nikki Haley fifth with 4%, and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) ranked sixth with 4%.
Mulvaney said the beer test was only part of the picture. Qualifications, she added, mattered most for specialized positions in the Cabinet. A strong presidential candidate needs to be an all-rounder, with an interesting personality and the ability to relate to voters.
“The beer test sets Vance ahead on the relatability aspect. His — unconfirmed, but tentatively assumed — status as heir apparent to Trump gives him an additional boost,” she said.
“In short, I don’t think the beer test alone is what gives Vance poll position, but it’s safe to say that at this moment in time, he certainly has it,” Mulvaney added. “Donald Trump Jr.’s second-place ranking among Republicans in the beer test is demonstrative of this: The fact that 15% of GOP voters want to get a beer with him doesn’t translate to support for his name on the 2028 ticket.”
Quote of the day
Trump has infuriated the entire non-American world by intervening in the World Cup and asking FIFA to overturn Folarin Balogun’s one-game suspension for a red card. Of course, he doesn’t care. Other leaders might have kept their role secret. Not this president.
“I asked for a review by FIFA. I spoke to a man who’s highly respected [Gianni Infantino]… I’m the one who got them to do it. It was not Biden, Biden was asleep,” he told reporters in the Oval Office on Monday.
Lunchtime reading
Europe prays for uneventful NATO summit: ‘No news is great news’: “No blowups, I think, would be the low bar that many would at least hope for.”
Sorry, Democrats: Your Midterm Hopes Are Probably Overblown: NOTUS takes a deep dive into what’s going wrong for Dems.