What Trump is looking for in his running mate

I want to go to the vice presidential sweepstakes for a minute and look at the competition to fill this slot, very important slot obviously.

And I'm trying to understand what Trump is looking for.

Here's one clue, by the way, as to what Trump is looking for.

I want you to just watch this for one second.

Unidentified Female: Will you accept the election results of 2024 no matter what happens, Senator?

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL): No matter what happens?

No, if it's an unfair election, I think it's going to be contested by each side.

Unidentified Female: Senator, no matter who wins.

Marco Rubio: I think you're asking the wrong person.

The Democrats are the ones that have opposed every Republican victory since 2000, every single one.

Unidentified Female: Yes or no.

Will you accept the election results of 2024 no matter who wins?

Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC): That is my statement.

Unidentified Female: But is it -- just yes or no, will you accept the election results of 2024?

Tim Scott: I look forward to President Trump being the 47th president.

Jeffrey Goldberg: So, loyalty is job one, correct.

Mara Liasson: We have gone way beyond the litmus test of saying you thought 2020 was fraudulent and rigged.

Now, we're saying, all these Republicans are refusing to say that they would accept the results of an election where Donald Trump doesn't win.

Donald Trump has never said he'd accept the results of an election if he didn't win.

He's been saying that since 2015.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Well, to be fair, some of them are parsing it a little bit and saying like, well, if it's fair, but then what's the definition of fair?

Mara Liasson: Yes, but Donald Trump said, he was asked if his supporters would be violent if he didn't win, and he said, well, I don't think that's going to happen because we're going to win, but he said, it depends on the fairness of an election, defined by him.

I mean, we are in a whole new place now.

This is not about re-litigating 2020.

This is a party.

Whose leadership says they will not accept the results of an election unless they win.

The peaceful transfer of power is the bedrock of democracy and one party doesn't believe in it.

Ed O'Keefe: But it's also like, will you accept the results of this election question is the new, would you accept the vice presidential nomination if it was offered to you question.

Like if you're not definitively answering that question, you're clearly interested in the job.

Because otherwise you're preserving -- you're taking a position -- Jeffrey Goldberg: That is a red line for Trump, in other words, like if you can't get over that first -- Ed O'Keefe: And they know that by taking those Sunday morning television bookings, that they're being tried out.

Mara Liasson: It's all an interview.

It's a job interview.

Ed O'Keefe: Yes, and Kristen Welker and Margaret Brennan get to conduct a job interview for Donald Trump.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Right.

So, not suggesting that you're being cynical about it, but you're saying that they literally want to go on the Sunday morning shows in order to show that -- in other words, they're not avoiding the question.

They're actively seeking out the question.

Ed O'Keefe: It would seem, wouldn't it?

Jeffrey Goldberg: I'm shocked.

Ed O'Keefe: Yes.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Shocked.

Ed O'Keefe: The T.V.

show where my president would like to see how well they perform.

Ed O'Keefe: My question though, when you look at this list of like seven, eight, nine names, Arkansas -- Jeffrey Goldberg: Have you been making that list the whole show?

Ed O'Keefe: No, beforehand.

Arkansas, Ohio, Florida, the Adirondacks, North Dakota, South Carolina.

None of those are growth opportunities for the Republican Party.

So, that's one thing.

None of those things matter.

Jeffrey Goldberg: So, in other words, he can't find a sufficient loyalist?

Ed O'Keefe: He doesn't want to.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Why wouldn't he want to find a loyalist who also happens to come -- Ed O'Keefe: Because this is a base-motivating election.

And so you have to find the guy.

Who reinforces to the party that we're going to take power and do everything we can to run this town.

And when they're coming from Arkansas, Ohio, Florida, although there's residency issues, Northern New York, North Dakota, or South Carolina, that's just the party.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Speaking of Florida, I don't have much of a doubt that Marco Rubio, who we just saw, would move to Georgia in order to run, do you, or wherever he -- because Donald Trump is not moving from Palm Beach.

Ed O'Keefe: Having covered the senator, since he was a senator when he ran for president, there are family considerations there with kids who've never lived anywhere else.

If they're all on board with it, it'll happen.

Mara Liasson: Can he senator from Florida?

Ed O'Keefe: And also that, by the way, yes.

I have not studied Florida election all that closely, but I got to believe there would be Floridians concerned with their -- Jeffrey Goldberg: Though I am no election expert, it seems that the Florida senator has to live in Florida, generally speaking.

Josh, not that I'm looking to you as the constitutional expert, but that seems to make sense, right?

Josh Gerstein: You would think so.

So, you know, maybe he doesn't have to take his family with him.

Jeffrey Goldberg: So, from your perspective, is this the paramount issue for Trump as he searches for a vice president, or is it the only issue?

Mara Liasson: What?

Loyalty, you mean?

Jeffrey Goldberg: The loyalty, the, I don't need another Mike Pence.

I don't need somebody who's going to -- Mara Liasson: Who brings a constituency or something like that?

Jeffrey Goldberg: Well, as opposed to, you know, I mean, in other words, the loyalty thing overwhelms every other thing.

Josh Gerstein: I think it does completely overwhelm anything else, even overwhelms ideology.

At some point, he takes into account what he thinks your appeal is going to be to get, as Ed says, to get his voters out, his base voters out.

But he won't even consider anyone that has not shown 100 percent loyalty.

And this is something we saw at the very end of the Trump administration and we're expecting to see at all levels of another Trump administration, which is like, it's not just the litmus test for the vice president, it's going to be the litmus test for anyone who serves in the Trump administration.

Jeffrey Goldberg: I do have one substantive or ideological question related to, policy related question to this.

He has Marco Rubio as a top tier candidate, classic Republican hawk on national security foreign policy.

He has J.D.

Vance who's kind of a neo-isolationist.

You've studied this stuff carefully.

Do you think that he could -- I think Trump's disposition is toward the quasi isolationism.

Do you think there's a chance for any traditional Republican hawk, not only Marco Rubio, but a person like Tom Cotton?

Do you think there's anybody who's possible with that?

Nancy Youssef: It's a fascinating question, isn't it?

Because I'm old enough to remember when a vice president was picked because he came from or she came from a battleground state or appealed to a certain demographic.

The fact that they have to now potentially be in line on foreign policy, which is an area that vice president doesn't usually come into, is an interesting dynamic.

So, we've seen Rubio start to move a little bit away from that.

We saw, for example, he voted no on the supplemental, which would have provided aid to Ukraine.

So, I guess the question is, one, does that person have to be an isolationist, and will these candidates be willing to move away from their traditional Republican positions towards Trump's to secure the, the nomination?

And if so, it really speaks to a shift in terms of the, the criteria we're looking for in a vice presidential nominee.

Jeffrey Goldberg: Nancy, before we go, I have to ask you one other question.

It's a Wall Street Journal question.

Donald Trump this week suggested that Vladimir Putin will release Evan Gershkovich, The Wall Street Journal journalist imprisoned in Russia, as a favor to Trump because they get along so well.

What's your reaction to that?

Nancy Youssef: Well, first of all, thank you for mentioning Evan.

It's been a year and 56 days that he's been held in a Russian prison, wrongfully detained for being a journalist.

Trump first mentioned him during the TIME Magazine interview.

He described him as a brave young man.

And now he sort of brings it up that he would be released if elected.

I would just say that, you know, hostages has traditionally been a bipartisan issue and that the position has been that we as Americans try to secure any American home.

And there have been hostages held when, when Trump was in office four years ago.

So, we'll see.