CLOAK AND DAGGER

Trump Ally’s Secret 2028 Plotting Exposed

A longtime senator has long been planning to take on JD Vance and Marco Rubio.

Ted Cruz has been quietly sounding out staffers for a potential bid to replace Donald Trump in 2028.

The MAGA hardliner has also been ramping up his public swipes at JD Vance and making regular trips to the key state of Iowa, according to the Wall Street Journal.

It has long been considered that Vance would do battle with Secretary of State Marco Rubio to succeed their “daddy,” Trump.

But insiders told the Rupert Murdoch-owned newspaper that Cruz hitting the podcast circuit and plugging his new book suggests he will throw his hat into the ring. Cruz last challenged the president in 2016.

Trump has even helped the three-term Texas senator promote his book, sharing a link to its Amazon page on Truth Social.

And the president, 80, didn’t rule out Cruz being on the ticket during an Oval Office announcement about renaming Lake Ontario last week. “Uhh, I would say that, uhh, he’s very talented,” Trump said.

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“He’s a very good friend of mine. I think he might do good, yeah. He’s a talented guy.”

It marks a thawing of their relationship, with the pair having traded fiery remarks in the 2016 Republican primary, when Trump branded Cruz “Lyin’ Ted,” linked his father to the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy, and mocked the appearance of Cruz’s wife, Heidi.

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Cruz, in turn, called the eventual winner a “trainwreck” and a “pathological liar” who could not be trusted in the White House.

Even still, he eventually endorsed him.

In 2018, Trump retired his nickname for his opponent. “He’s not ‘Lyin’ Ted’ anymore. He’s ‘Beautiful Ted.’ I call him ‘Texas Ted,’” he said.

On Sean Hannity’s podcast on Wednesday, Cruz called his former derogatory nickname “political genius.”

Last week’s Oval Office boost from Trump comes at a convenient time for Cruz, who said on Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick’s podcast last Wednesday, “It’s no secret that I want to be president.”

Asked flatly if he intends to run, he said, “Time will tell.”

The day before the podcast, the senator had exclaimed, “Oh, no!” after being asked if Vance, 42, is the inevitable 2028 Republican nominee.

“There’s going to be a full discussion about who we are and what we believe,” Cruz told MS Now’s Way Too Early.

And he told the PBD podcast on Wednesday that the now-abandoned memorandum of understanding with Iran, a bid to bring an end to the war, had been “a terrible deal” that “JD negotiated”.

The remarks appear to be the tip of the iceberg of growing tension between the senator and the vice president. The Washington Post reported last December that Cruz was privately bad-mouthing Vance to donors, particularly his isolationist foreign policy views.

The president, meanwhile, has pitted Vance and Rubio against each other, often asking Republican donors, advisers, and dinner guests which of the two men should run for president.

Trump privately indicated that he does see Vance as his successor in a private Oval Office meeting with donors last month, saying, “At the end of the day, we need to elect JD,” two sources told The Washington Post.

But six other people close to Trump warned that the erratic president, who tends to change his mind at a moment’s notice, may not have settled on Vance and noted that Trump tells different things to different people.

Vance has repeatedly said that he is focused on his job as VP. However, his wife, Usha Vance, said she is keeping an “open mind and open heart” about their political future.

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In an interview with Fox News’ Fox & Friends, which aired on Wednesday, she said: “Whatever it is that he feels is the right thing for him to do, we’re going to have a good time doing it. We will make the best of it in the best possible way.”

Vance and Cruz’s offices have been approached for comment.

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