Who do some select Republican party leaders think Donald Trump will face in the 2020 presidential campaign?
Joe Biden or Bernie Sanders, according to panelists at a Thursday afternoon session at SALT 2019 in Las Vegas.
During “lightning round” questioning, moderator Jack Oliver asked Trump 2016 campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele, Citizens United President David Bossie and former California congressman (and current Trump nominee to be director of the U.S. Trade and Development Agency) Darrell Issa who they thought would win the Democratic nomination.
They were also asked who they thought the running mate pick would be, and which swing states to keep a close eye on.
- Lewandowski predicted Bernie Sanders would come out of the crowded Democratic field, and would pick Kamala Harris as his running mate. He thinks they’d run on the key issue of health care, and said to keep an eye on Minnesota.
- Issa said Sanders and Harris, who he called a “dream team” for the left with New York’s Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) on the sidelines for 2020. Issa said the Rust Belt states of Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin were ones to watch.
- Steele said if the Democrats want to have a shot, Biden is the nominee and Minnesota Senator Amy Klobuchar is his running mate because she could “lock down the middle of the country” and help in swing states like Michigan and Wisconsin. He predicts the key issue for them would be health care, and echoed Pennsylvania being a key battleground state.
- Bossie said he expects it to be Joe Biden, because if it’s Bernie Sanders, its socialism vs. economic freedom and that’s a campaign the Republicans would be eager to run on. Bossie pointed to Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin, and stressed the importance of holding on to Ohio, Iowa and Georgia, as being “the spine of our reelection.”
Among some “rising stars” in the Republican party, panelists mentioned House Freedom Caucus members Mark Meadows and Jim Jordan; Nikki Haley; Mike Pompeo; Kentucky Governor Matt Bevin, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, and Texas Congressman Dan Crenshaw.