538 Republican Presidential Odds: Bush, Walker, and Rubio at the top

[Mr. Morden]

Here's the podcast where they discuss their reasoning:

https://soundcloud.com/fivethirtyeight/totally-subjective-presidential-odds-32015

[Mr. Morden]

Yeah, I get that. But Pence has shown no interest in running and even shut down a bill allowing him to run for president and Governor simultaneously. Meanwhile, Kasich has been open about considering a run and touring the early primary states.

Pence dodges the question when he's asked if he'll run for president (unlike folks like Corker, Portman, Romney, Ryan, etc., who've explicitly ruled out running), and is scheduled to go to early caucus state Nevada next month, to suck up to Sheldon Adelson.  So I wouldn't say he's shown *no* interest.

But yeah, Kasich has shown at least somewhat more interest of late.

[Mr. Morden]

For the life of me, I can't even comprehend how absolutely delusional Rubio must be in order to give up his prominent Senate seat in order to make a quixotic charge at the Republican nomination that we all know he has no chance of winning.

I don't think he has *no* chance of winning the nomination.  He has a much better chance than the majority of the candidates who are/will be running.

In any case, as I think I've said before, Rubio doesn't care about his Senate seat.  It's just a stepping stone to the White House for him.  And even if he doesn't win the nomination this time, if he manages to make a strong showing of it, it could set him up for another run in 2020.  Alternatively, if Walker, or some other non-Floridian white male, wins the nomination this time, and they want a Hispanic running mate, Rubio has a shot at the #2 spot on the ticket.  But that's more likely to happen if he's not in the middle of running for reelection for Senate.