When Marco Rubio leaves the Senate to become Donald Trump’s secretary of state, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis will choose his replacement.
Polymarket, a decentralized prediction market exchange, gives Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody a 62% chance of filling Rubio’s seat. Meanwhile, the American prediction market platform Kalshi gives Moody a 60% chance of being appointed.
Lara Trump’s odds dipped after Trump expressed doubt that DeSantis would put her in Rubio’s seat. Lara is the president-elect’s daughter-in-law and a rising star in MAGA politics. However, prediction markets suggest that DeSantis will support a MAGA candidate outside of the Trump family.
Trump MAGA vs. DeSantis MAGA
Rubio’s replacement is an acid test for DeSantis. He was a former presidential candidate and must view his decision through the lens of his likely 2028 presidential campaign, deciding whether to position himself in the Trump camp or his own brand of MAGA.
Moody is an experienced public servant who used her term as Florida attorney general to build her MAGA credentials. She supported President-elect Trump’s false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. Moody has also supported ending the federal investigation into former Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, who was convicted of lying to the FBI.
Lara Trump replaced Ronna McDaniel as the Republican National Committee (RNC) co-chair. It was one of Trump’s most direct assumptions of power over the Republican Party establishment. Trump transformed the Republican Party into a party of Trump, a pivot from its Reagan-era priorities. It’s why the Republican National Convention featured Trump’s inner circle instead of any of the surviving Republican presidents and presidential nominees.
While the president-elect briefly pushed Lara Trump to fill Rubio’s seat, DeSantis seems more likely to choose a MAGA candidate from his own camp. Trump’s era will end after his second term, but his voters’ grievances will remain. A MAGA Senate pick, even if it’s not a Trump, aligned with DeSantis could bolster his support among the MAGA wing of the Republican Party.
MAGA support will be a valuable defense going into the Republican presidential primaries in the first post-Trump election. Kalshi gives DeSantis a 6% chance of being the Republican presidential nominee in 2028. J.D. Vance is the current frontrunner with a 45% chance to sit atop the ticket.
