Vice President JD Vance handily won the 2028 Republican presidential nominee straw poll at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) this week, receiving an overwhelming majority of votes over former Trump adviser Steve Bannon and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.

The poll, asking CPAC attendees who they would vote for in the next GOP presidential primary election, was shared by former White House press secretary Sean Spicer on X:

Vance, a former U.S. senator from Ohio and author of New York Times bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy, came out on top with 61 percent of the vote. 

The runner-up was Bannon, host of the War Room show, with 12 percent of the vote. 

DeSantis, a former Trump foe on the 2024 election trail, received just seven percent.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) both garnered three percent, while Donald Trump, Jr., Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and former 2024 presidential candidate-turned Trump ally Vivek Ramaswamy each got two percent.

Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R), Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), Homeland Security Sec. Kristi Noem, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) each garnered one percent of the vote.

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) was also a choice on the straw poll but received no votes, and four percent of the conference-goers remained “undecided.”

President Donald Trump was favored to win the 2024 GOP nomination in the 2023 CPAC straw poll, beating DeSantis by a staggering 40 points. 

The results of CPAC’s straw polls are “one of the most watched moments of the Republican confab,” and are “followed closely by politicians, fundraisers and the press as a barometer of the mood of conservatives,” the New York Post‘s Jon Levine wrote.

The poll also revealed that virtually all attendees are fully on board with Trump’s actions since reentering office in January, with 99 percent of participants saying they agreed with the statement “The first few weeks of Donald Trump’s presidency have been the best for the modern conservative movement in my lifetime” — with 94 percent saying they “strongly agreed.”  

In another question asking attendees whether Trump and the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) should be allowed to have control over funding for federal agencies rather than Congress, 89 percent sided with the Trump administration.