2028 Republican nominee odds: JD Vance falls to 32% after the midterms as Ron DeSantis jumps from 4% to 15%

The race for the 2028 Republican nomination is more open than at any point this year. After the Democrats won back the House and the Senate on 3 November, Polymarket’s market on the Republican nominee has JD Vance at 32%, Marco Rubio at 21% and Ron DeSantis at 15%. Kalshi has almost the same order: Vance 33¢, Rubio 21¢, DeSantis 17¢.

Two months ago Vance was a clear favourite above 50%. DeSantis, the term-limited governor of Florida, was under 5% until the week of the election. The market on the nominee has traded more than $732 million on Polymarket, one of its largest political markets.

The odds

Polymarket: midpoint or last price; Kalshi: last trade. 9 November 2026.

The two exchanges agree closely. The biggest gap is on DeSantis, 15% on Polymarket and 17¢ on Kalshi. Kalshi also lists Donald J. Trump at 1.5¢, although the 22nd Amendment bars a president from being elected more than twice.

How the odds moved this year

• Vance began 2026 at 53.5%, fell to a low of about 31% in June, climbed back above 51% by mid-September, and has slid since: 48.5% in mid-October, 38.8% on 1 November and 31.4% on 5 November, the day after the election. He is at 32.2% now.
• Rubio has been the steadiest challenger. He started the year under 10%, rose to about 27% in the spring and summer, dropped to 14% in mid-October and has recovered to 21%.
• DeSantis was between about 2% and 5% all year, and still 4.3% as the results came in. Within a day he had jumped to 11.3%, then 14.2% by 7 November and 15% now.

Why the midterms changed the race

Republicans lost control of both chambers of Congress on 3 November, Newsweek reported. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich wrote that the result “makes the race for the GOP presidential nomination wide open,” and that a big Republican win would have made Vance “almost certainly” the nominee.

Vance offered his own explanation. “The reason we lost is the war,” he wrote on X, according to Newsweek, adding that losing the Senate for the next six years was a bad trade.

The losses hit Republicans in states that had been safe for a generation. Pollster Doug Kaplan told Fox News that DeSantis had “found his lane if he wants to run for president in 2028,” and noted that Vance’s former Senate seat in Ohio had gone to Democrat Sherrod Brown.

DeSantis: the biggest mover

The day after the election, DeSantis told a news conference: “This is close to an extinction-level event for Republicans,” adding that of the 10 largest states, only Florida would have Republican control, Fox News reported. He called it “the political equivalent of a meteor strike,” according to ABC News. Florida’s Republican nominees won, including Byron Donalds for governor, though Newsweek reported the margins were far tighter than two years earlier.

On 6 November the Washington Post reported, citing three people briefed on his plans, that DeSantis was preparing a second presidential run and had contacted at least one national political consultant. DeSantis denied it on X: “The Washington Post is fabricating this out of whole cloth,” he wrote. “I have not reached out to anybody about running for anything.” Two people familiar with his thinking told ABC News that he is keeping his options open and “still watching the political environment.”

In a recent interview, DeSantis had been noncommittal: “Maybe someday. I don’t know about ’28. Maybe later. Maybe. We’ll see,” Newsweek reported.

The market has taken the possibility seriously. His price more than tripled in a week, and Newsweek reported his Kalshi price at 18% as of Friday, up from under 4% on Monday. He has history to overcome: in his 2024 run he lost the Iowa caucuses by 30 points, Newsweek noted.

Vance: still the favourite, but weaker

Vance remains the single most likely nominee on both exchanges, but at about one in three. A year ago he said he would decide after the midterms. “We’re going to do everything that we can to win the midterms,” he told Sean Hannity in November 2025, The Hill reported. “And then after that, I’m going to sit down with the president of the United States and talk to him about it.”

The market’s problem with Vance is not a rival’s rise so much as his own exposure to the midterm result. As vice president, he is closely tied to the administration’s record, including the war he blamed for the losses. His price fell about 20 points between mid-September and the day after the election.

Rubio: the quiet second

Rubio, the secretary of state, has said little. He told The New York Times that working for President Trump until the end of his term has “always been my plan,” and declined to say whether he was considering a run: “I literally will not talk about 2028 anymore,” Newsweek reported.

Vance and Rubio have played down any rivalry. “If Marco eventually runs for president, then we can cross that bridge when we come to it,” Vance said in 2025, and he has called Rubio “my best friend in the administration.” The market gives the two of them a combined 54%, down from about 63% in mid-October and 68% in mid-September.

The rest of the field

• Tucker Carlson (3.75%) peaked at about 6.5% in late spring and has drifted lower.
• John McEntee (3.5%) is priced level with Carlson on both exchanges.
• Ted Cruz (2.8%) was named by both Gingrich and Kaplan as someone who might see an opening.
• Thomas Massie (2.75%), Glenn Youngkin (2.3%) and Brian Kemp (1.75%) complete the list above 1.5%.

Together the field outside the top three adds up to roughly 30%, a sign of how uncertain the race is two years before the primaries.

Where the money is

The most traded candidates are not the most likely ones. On Polymarket, Ted Cruz’s market has traded about $20 million and Brian Kemp’s about $18.5 million, more than Vance’s $17 million, even though both are priced under 3%. Long-dated markets on outsiders attract a lot of trading at low prices, and money placed at 1¢ or 2¢ adds up across a year and a half.

On Kalshi, measured in contracts, Rubio is the most traded at about 6.6 million, followed by Vance at 5.5 million, Carlson at 5.4 million and DeSantis at 4.7 million. Kalshi’s market on Donald J. Trump has traded about 5 million contracts despite the constitutional bar.

How to think about these prices

Two years out, a 32% favourite is a long way from a lock. Primaries reward momentum, and the field has not formed: none of the top three has announced a run. A few things are worth keeping in mind:

• The prices move on news, not on votes. No primary votes will be cast until 2028. Until then, the market is pricing statements, reports and denials, which is why DeSantis could triple in a week on a news conference and a newspaper report he called fabricated.
• Long-dated long shots are sticky. Selling a 2¢ candidate means tying up 98¢ for more than a year and a half to earn 2¢. Few traders bother, so small prices can stay above the candidates’ real chances (are prediction markets accurate?).
• The two exchanges are close. Any gap between Polymarket and Kalshi is a cent or two on the main names, so there is little to gain from switching venues for the same bet (prediction market arbitrage).

What to watch next

• Vance’s decision. He said he would sit down with the president after the midterms to discuss a run. Any sign of that conversation, or of the president’s view, will move the market.
• DeSantis’s next step. A person familiar with his thinking told ABC News that he “cannot wait too long to enter the presidential race.” A formal signal, or a firmer denial, would settle a lot of the recent move. He is term-limited as governor, so his time in office ends after 2026.
• Rubio’s silence. He has said he will not talk about 2028. Every week that holds keeps his price driven by others’ news.
• The rest of the field. Gingrich and Kaplan both named Cruz as someone who might see an opening after the midterms. A serious move by Cruz, or by a governor such as Kemp or Youngkin, would take share from all three leaders.

How these markets settle

Polymarket’s market resolves Yes for the person who wins and accepts the Republican nomination for president in 2028, based on official Republican Party sources. If the nominee is replaced before election day, the market does not change. Kalshi’s market uses the same test: the person who wins and accepts the nomination.

It is a long-dated market. Money placed now is tied up until the summer of 2028, which is one reason prices of 1% to 3% on minor candidates can stay high: there is little reward for selling them down (how to read market rules). Polymarket charges takers 4% × price × (1 − price) on political markets; Kalshi’s standard taker fee is 7% × price × (1 − price) (fees compared).

The other side

On the Democratic side, the midterms lifted Georgia senator Jon Ossoff to about 26% (2028 Democratic nominee odds). For the general election, including which party is favoured to win the White House, see 2028 presidential election odds. For how the midterms themselves played out on the markets, see our midterm accuracy study.

Live prices: Republican nominee on Polymarket and on Kalshi.

Prices as of 9 November 2026. Sources: Polymarket and Kalshi market data; Fox News (4 and 7 November 2026), ABC News (7 November 2026), Newsweek, and The Hill (14 November 2025). Nothing here is financial advice.