Billionaire Mark Cuban has said that if he were to run for president in 2020, then he would run as a Republican and would therefore challenge the incumbent, Donald Trump, in the party’s primary.
‘I think there’s a place for somebody who is socially a centrist but I’m very fiscally conservative,’ Cuban said in a Sunday night interview at his Dallas, Texas home with Fox News show ‘OBJECTified’.
Cuban discussed with the show’s host, Harvey Levin,’ how he fashions himself as ‘fiercely independent’ but would decide to run as a Republican under the United States two-party system.
Mark Cuban spoke with Harvey Levin on the Fox News show ‘OBJECTified’ on Sunday night. On the show, he said that he would challenge Donald Trump as a Republican if he were to run for president in 2020
Trump has multiple potential contenders vying to take his place as the Republican presidential candidate in 2020. Cuban previously said: ‘The door is wide open. It’s just a question of who can pull it off’
‘We’re going into an era where people want someone who comes up with solutions. I think we’re going into a time where you need somebody who can connect to people and relate to people at a base level and appreciate what they’re going through.
‘And I think I qualify on each of those,’ Cuban said.
The Dallas Mavericks owner also said that he is asked ‘100 times a day’ whether or not he would run. He said that on a 1-10 scale of the likelihood of him running, he is currently at a ‘4’.
Cuban also discussed how he initially supported Donald Trump. He eventually endorsed Hillary Clinton.
Speaking of Trump, he said: ‘I liked the fact that he was honest, outspoken, that he wasn’t like I told him a Stepford candidate.’
In late September, Cuban said that Trump needs to be able to ‘take the blowback’ after criticizing the NFL and revoking a White House invitation to Golden State Warriors’ star Stephen Curry.
‘If the president’s going to say something condemning a person, an industry, a sport, then he’s got to be able to take the blowback that’s going to come back,’ Cuban told NBC News.
Ohio governor John Kasich was the last Republican candidate to withdraw in the 2016 campaign. He did not endorse Trump, and has been touted as a potential challenger to the current president
Nebraska senator Ben Sasse, pictured on Late Night with Seth Meyers, visited Iowa over the summer. The midwestern state hosts the nation’s first presidential caucuses
The comment is one of the many the outspoken businessman has made about Trump, who is increasingly viewed as divisive and incompetent even within his own party.
‘His base won’t turn on him, but if there is someone they can connect to and feel confident in, they might turn away from him,’ Cuban told The Associated Press in August.
‘The door is wide open. It’s just a question of who can pull it off.’
Indeed, just seven months into the Trump presidency, Republicans and right-leaning independents have begun to contemplate the possibility of an organized bid to take down the sitting president in 2020.
GOP officials from New Hampshire to Arizona have wondered aloud about the possibility of a 2020 primary challenge from a fellow Republican or right-leaning independent. No one has stepped forward yet, however, and the list of potential prospects remains small.
‘Baywatch’ star Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson has been encouraged to run in 2020
Ohio’s GOP Governor John Kasich has not ruled out a second run in 2020.
Another Republican and frequent Trump critic, Nebraska Senator Ben Sasse, last month visited Iowa, which hosts the nation’s first presidential caucuses.
And a handful of wealthy outsiders including Cuban and wrestler-turned-actor Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, are being encouraged to join the fray.
Yet there is good reason why no sitting president since Franklin Pierce in 1852 has been defeated by a member of his own party. As is almost always the case, the most passionate voters in the president’s party remain loyal. And in Trump’s case, activists across the country are starting to come around.
The president has personally installed his own leadership team at the Republican National Committee and in states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire, where new GOP chairmen are more devout Trump supporters than their predecessors.