This column is being republished with permission from its original home on Substack. For more from Liz Mair, subscribe here.

Though we’re still 54 days out from the 2026 midterm elections, the 2028 presidential race seems likely to be well underway shortly. With that in mind, I’ve been thinking about a potential candidate that—so far as I am aware—no one else is even talking about: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

I’ve vaguely known Duffy for a long time. I first encountered him in 2008; he struck me as very personable and much smarter than people expected—because he’s cute (yes, he is!), people assume he’s dumb. He had easy-to-spot raw political talent, so it wasn’t surprising to me that, after retiring from the House and becoming a lobbyist, Duffy would return to politics—though I might not have guessed he’d run for Wisconsin Governor before joining a presidential administration.

Now, the Department of Transportation is not normally a job where future stars of a political party go to shine, it might be said. (Duly noted that Pete Buttigieg is trying to relaunch his political career after having that exact job just a few years back). Nonetheless, Duffy continues to grab attention. And I think he’s someone whose star could continue to rise.

The conventional wisdom is that Duffy, while being probably among Trump’s most competent Cabinet secretaries, is also kind of a lightweight, still too much wedded to his now long-ago status as a reality TV star, too willing to drift into TMI-sharing and shirking-tough-work-for-the-limelight (though perhaps less of it, relative to his old The Real World days).

But I think these episodes might signal why, and how, Duffy could have a third act in his political career, after the second Trump administration is........

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