The appearance was a way of reconnecting with low-propensity voters who were crucial to putting President Donald Trump back in the White House with a plurality of the popular vote, but who are now unhappy about the Iran war and what they see as insufficient transparency on Jeffrey Epstein.
Rogan himself holds many of these views. He endorsed Trump in 2024 but has since complained about broken promises. Trump and Vance both appeared on his show during that campaign, while former Vice President Kamala Harris famously did not.
Thirty or 40 years ago, the White House might have dispatched an Ohioan vice president to shore up the Reagan Democrats. Now it’s the Rogan Democrats.
That’s a set of anti-establishment voters who stretch from the Bernie Sanders Left to the MAGA Right, and everything in between, such as the “Make America Healthy Again” movement.
These less conventionally Republican parts of Trump’s coalition were rewarded with the appointment of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as secretary of health and human services and Tulsi Gabbard as director of national intelligence.
Gabbard has since resigned, citing her husband’s health, though supporters felt she had been marginalized within the administration beforehand. Kennedy is still on board, but MAHA is getting restless.
Many of these types of voters would become an important part of Vance’s base if he decides to run for president in 2028.
Lower-propensity voters are by definition difficult to turn out, especially in nonpresidential election years. Trump has throughout his decade in national politics struggled to reliably transfer his popularity to other Republicans when he is not on the ballot himself. The Resistance is motivated to show up at the polls, but not so large chunks of MAGA.
The question remains how large these voting blocs are outside of social media compared to the more traditional parts of the Republican coalition. In 2024, the number didn’t have to be huge — Trump won the seven battleground states by the narrowest of margins and topped Harris in the popular vote by less than 1.5 points.
Most incumbent congressional Republicans do little to court these nontraditional voters because they hail from deep-red districts and don’t necessarily need them.
That’s where Vance comes in, though his critics say he is too “online” and too solicitous of podcasters, some of whom indulge in conspiracy theories and strident criticism of Israel.
Vance bantered with Rogan about whether the disgraced Epstein had Mossad ties and the subject of Israeli influence in American politics, citing a Time magazine article about former Trump operative Brad Parscale.
“I have never funded, organized, or participated in any effort to undermine President Trump — ever — including his MOU or ceasefire proposal,” Parscale insisted to Time. “The claim that I am coordinating an effort to prolong the war is completely false.”
“They’re attacking me obsessively, saying that we should not be negotiating with Iran. We should just keep the military campaign going indefinitely, and that is their explicit position,” Vance told Rogan. “People have come after me and say that I’m influenced by Qatar, that I’m influenced by foreign governments, that I take my marching orders from Tucker Carlson, and there’s just so much bulls*** out there.”
The same day the Rogan episode aired, the House rejected an amendment to cut all aid to Israel. Its sponsor, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY), was beaten by a Trump-endorsed primary challenger in May and was on an island among Republicans while Democrats were split roughly down the middle.
In three presidential campaigns, Trump threaded the needle in seeming prudently skeptical of recent American military undertakings in the Middle East while at the same time supporting Israel against its enemies. The Iran war has complicated that delicate balance.
TRUMP DROPS STRAIT OF HORMUZ TOLLS FOR GULF TRADE DEALS
While most polling shows rank-and-file Republicans and self-professed MAGA supporters sticking with Trump, Vance is the point man on calming doubters.
Vance is the clear early front-runner for the 2028 GOP nomination, leading by 19.3 points in the latest RealClearPolitics average of polls. If he chooses to run, he’ll have to strike the same balance that Trump once did to hold an unwieldy coalition together.
