Imagine that you are one of the tech barons who stood behind Trump at the inauguration. You promised to be loyal to him; in exchange, he said he would have your back, and he delivered. You would gladly vote for him in 2028 if you could.
But he isn’t on the ballot, and you have to make an awkward choice. You don’t completely trust J.D., given his populist rhetoric; you know only too well that he tells radically different stories to different groups. Still, he has plenty of personal history with people like you, so that is somewhat reassuring. On the other hand, all of the Democratic candidates want to impose new guardrails on you; it’s just a matter of degree. You don’t like that at all.
The polls suggest that the Democrats are going to win. What do you do? Do you go all in for J.D. and suffer the consequences if he loses, or do you hedge your bets?
It’s a tough call. My guess is that the barons will more or less split down the middle on this choice if they are faced with it.