James Carville predicts next GOP candidate turns on Trump from surprising direction

Veteran political strategist James Carville predicted that the next GOP primary front-runners will attack President Donald Trump from an unexpected direction.

In a clip from the Politics War Room podcast, a viewer asked Carville if the GOP will "return to normal" by nominating candidates like Jeb Bush or Nikki Haley in the 2028 presidential election, which will decide Trump's successor. Carville and co-host Al Hunt doubted that future successful GOP presidential candidates will come from the center-right like Bush or Haley, however.

"A candidate, or more than one, is going to run for the Republican nominee and attack Trump on the basis that he lost connection with MAGA," Carville predicted. "He wasn't MAGA enough."

He elaborated on his prediction of what successful GOP candidates will say, adding, "When Trump starts losing MAGA, people are going to start attacking him, saying, 'The reason you fell down, you were popular, but then you turned your base on MAGA,' and they gonna use the Iran war as example number one to attack him. MAGA doesn't like that."

The June 27 runoff election to select the GOP nominee to replace outgoing Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) will be a "telltale event" for how accurately he's reading the shift among GOP voters, Carville said. The race is between the Trump-endorsed Rep. Julia Letlow (R-LA) and Louisiana State Treasurer John Fleming, who is "way to the right of the MAGA-endorsed candidate," Carville said.

"My prediction is it's not going to be Nikki Haley or Jeb Bush or something like that. It's going to be a person who runs at MAGAism from the right," Carville said. "So pay attention. I think the attack that's coming at Trump will insist he lost his MAGA core, his central theme."