Rand Paul lit into Markwayne Mullin at his confirmation hearing – called him unfit for the job – and the Senate confirmed Mullin anyway.
JD Vance just locked up 53 percent at CPAC and Trump is already pointing at him as the heir to MAGA.
And Paul just told the country he's circling the 2028 race for one reason that has nothing to do with Mullin and everything to do with what's happened to the Republican Party.
The Last Man Standing for Free Trade
Paul sat down with CBS News Sunday Morning this week and delivered a line that should stop every fiscal conservative cold.
"There used to really be a free market/libertarian wing of the party, and now there's not much left."
Then the part that lands harder.
"In fact, on many days it's me in the Senate, the only one left for free trade."
One senator. The whole Senate. Last man standing.
He voted against Trump's One Big Beautiful Bill because it added trillions to the national debt.
He voted with Democrats on a war powers resolution to rein in Trump's military strikes on Iran.
He went after Mullin to his face at the confirmation hearing and walked away with nothing – the Senate confirmed Mullin on a party-line vote.
"We're thinking about it," Paul told CBS. "I would say 50-50."
https://twitter.com/amconmag/status/2037618187974398219?s=20
He'll make his decision after the 2026 midterms.
The Signal He's Watching
Paul isn't watching Vance's poll numbers to decide.
He's watching Kentucky Rep. Thomas Massie.
Massie is the one House member who votes like Paul does – against the big spending bills, against the war authorizations, against anything that grows the debt or puts American troops somewhere they don't need to be.
He's facing a Trump-endorsed primary challenger named Ed Gallrein in 2026.
If Massie survives, Paul reads that as proof the libertarian lane still has voters in it.
If Massie gets rolled, Paul has his answer.
That's colder and smarter than anything the 2016 version of Rand Paul ever calculated.
In 2016, Paul ran as the libertarian alternative in a crowded field and got swallowed whole.
Trump owned the anti-establishment lane. Cruz owned the evangelical base.
Paul ended up with 4.5 percent in Iowa and was on a plane home before New Hampshire voted.
https://twitter.com/RandPaul/status/2038307951606108383?s=20
The candidate who called Trump a "delusional narcissist" and a "fake conservative" didn't make it past February.
The 2028 map looks different – but only if the voters Paul needs actually show up in primary numbers.
Why Vance Should Take This Seriously
Vance won 53 percent at CPAC.
Rubio – riding a wave of visibility from his Iran diplomacy – came in at 35 percent.
Paul got one percent.
And yet Paul has already visited Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina while Vance was collecting straw poll votes and donor pledges.
Straw polls don't vote. Iowa caucus-goers do.
Paul's theory of the race isn't crazy.
Tariffs are taxes – every dollar at the border is a dollar American businesses pay and American consumers feel at the register.
The Iran war polls badly outside the Republican base.
The One Big Beautiful Bill added to a debt that fiscal conservatives watched explode and are watching continue to climb.
Paul laid out the coalition he thinks is available: combine the libertarian-leaning voters with the Chamber of Commerce crowd and the traditional business community that hates protectionism, and "there may be a force out there for a different direction from the party other than being continued to be led by populism."
That's not a campaign slogan.
That's a man who got destroyed once doing the math before he tries again.
Watch Thomas Massie in 2026.
That primary race is the earliest answer to whether Rand Paul runs – or quietly goes back to being the last libertarian left in the Senate.
Sources:
- Lindsay Kornick, "Rand Paul says he's '50-50' on running for president in 2028," Fox News, March 29, 2026.
- Paul Steinhauser, "Rand Paul leaves door open to possible 2028 presidential run," Fox News, March 2026.
- "CPAC 2026 straw poll: JD Vance is the 2028 GOP frontrunner for second year in a row," Washington Examiner, March 28, 2026.
- "Rand Paul says he's '50-50' on running for president in 2028," Washington Examiner, March 2026.
- Henry J. Gomez and Matt Dixon, "As Vance locks down early 2028 support, would-be GOP rivals look for ways to stand out," NBC News, January 14, 2026.
- "Rand Paul presidential campaign, 2016," Ballotpedia.