Watch: JD Vance and AOC Trade 2028 Barbs as Speculation Heats Up
Vice President J.D. Vance has formidable rhetorical and analytical skills, neither of which the Democrats can match.
As a prognosticator, however, he probably underestimates the collective guile of the Democratic Party establishment.
In a clip of an interview with Michael Knowles of the Daily Wire, posted Wednesday to YouTube, Vance predicted that in 2028 Democrats will make Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York their presidential nominee.
This prompted a confident-sounding reply from Ocasio-Cortez, commonly known as AOC, who exhibited a bit more apparent swagger than her actual presidential prospects warrant.
“I think it’s gotta be AOC,” the vice president replied when Knowles asked about the leading Democrat for 2028. “I know that’s probably conventional wisdom.”
At that point, Knowles interrupted and observed that, in his view, conventional wisdom favors Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom of California.
From there, both the interviewer and the interviewee had a bit of fun at Newsom’s expense.
“No. No. I don’t buy that,” Vance replied.
The vice president then reminded Knowles that Newsom already committed an epic gaffe. In February, the California governor told a group of black Americans that he understood them because he, too, underperformed academically.
Vance, in other words, considers Newsom’s gaffe politically fatal.
When Knowles pressed the issue by mentioning, for instance, Democratic Sen. Jon Ossoff of Georgia, the vice president offered an astute observation about who controls the Democratic Party.
“If you think the answer is Wall Street and the left-of-center business community,” Vance said, “then it would be Ossoff. And if you think it’s the universities, it would be AOC.”
At the end of the clip, the Daily Wire showed AOC responding to a reporter’s question about Vance’s prediction, saying “I hope he is” the Republican nominee.
“That’s what I’ll say,” the lawmaker remarked after smiling and pausing for a few seconds.
In truth, AOC looked and sounded more smitten than sincere.
Notwithstanding the obligatory dig, she seemed to relish both the compliment and the prospect of winning the 2028 nomination.
To give credit where due, Vance certainly sees which way the wind blows in the modern Democratic Party.
Led by Democratic Mayor Zohran Mamdani of New York City, socialists have proven themselves a formidable force in Democrat politics. Last week, for instance, three Mamdani-endorsed socialists defeated establishment-backed primary opponents.
Moreover, on college and university campuses, socialism does amount to mainstream thought.
AOC, a socialist by temperament, would seem to benefit from the Democrats’ leftward lurch.
On the other hand, the lawmaker almost certainly will face hitherto unfathomable levels of resistance from establishment Democrats.
For one thing, Democrats have not conducted a genuine presidential primary since 2008. Recall that the party did everything possible to freeze out independent socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders in 2016 and again in 2020, when party loyalists dutifully coalesced around nominees Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden, respectively.
Then, in 2024, Democrats conducted no meaningful primary. Instead, they forced out the cognitively diminished Biden and simply tapped then-Vice President Kamala Harris his successor.
In other words, Democrats have long operated more like an organized crime family than a political party.
Secondly, the party most capable of limitless electoral shenanigans even against its own candidates is desperate to win in 2028.
Given that desperation, and assuming the vice president wins the GOP nomination, does anyone believe Democrats will allow AOC on a debate stage against Vance?
Surely they remember how Vance mopped the floor with Democratic Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota in the lone 2024 vice presidential debate.
To put it mildly, AOC has too much of Harris in her to compete with Vance. The lawmaker, after all, has already shown off her massive rhetorical limitations. No doubt the 2028 campaign cycle will generate even more Harris-like word salads from AOC.
In fact, there is some evidence that Vance himself does not take Ocasio-Cortez seriously.
Thus, in predicting an AOC-led 2028 Democratic ticket, might the vice president have engaged in some wishful thinking?
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